


The Future's Out to Get You

by rose_lighters



Series: Worried What the Future Holds [2]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Allison Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Apocalypse, BAMF Number Five | The Boy (Umbrella Academy), Ben Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Canon Rewrite, Canon-Typical Torture, Canon-Typical Violence, Diego Hargreeves Needs A Hug, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Good Brother Luther Hargreeves, Hurt Klaus Hargreeves, Insane Vanya Hargreeves, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Luther Hargreeves Needs A Hug, M/M, Not Beta Read, Number Five | The Boy Needs A Hug, Past Child Abuse, Past Drug Addiction, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting, They all need hugs, Vietnam, Vietnam War, but they dont get them, does it count as a fix it if your just breaking different things?, not vanya friendly, the first few chapters are similar to the show
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2020-09-29 17:40:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20439926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rose_lighters/pseuds/rose_lighters
Summary: Over half a decade had passed since Vanya Hargreeves had published her autobiography and her siblings were still bitter about it. United by their father's death they must try to prevent the end of times whilst their sister sinks deeper and deeper into insanity.With no Harold Jenkins pulling strings behind the scenes how will the apocalypse play out and can Five prevent it with no clues as to how?You don't have to read the first to understand this





	1. If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next

_ **And on the street tonight** _  
_ **An old man plays with newspaper cuttings of his glory days** _  
_ **And if you tolerate this then your children will be next** _

The news that eccentric billionaire Reginald Hargreeves had died broke on the twenty third day of March. It was a cold, gloomy day but despite this the amount of people who were sad about his death was minimal. The man had raised seven children and of those who had survived into adulthood only one cared, though even he only cared out of a sense of duty.

Vanya Hargreeves heard of her adopted father’s death on the way home from violin practice at the theatre. Vanya was a petite woman with thin brown hair and forgettable features, in fact everything about Vanya was quite ordinary. She was an okay violinist in a mediocre orchestra, she live in an area that was fine in a flat that was bare and just enough. She led a modest life, playing and teaching violin and taking her pills on time.

A whispered “Dad.” was her only reaction to his passing.

Klaus Hargreeves was very unlike his sister, he was the definition of middle child syndrome, which is to say very bloody annoying. He was a very tall and thin man with thick curly hair and a very bold taste in fashion. He was also almost never seen without some kind of illness, a result of drug use and homelessness that had plagued his younger years. His life was also far more manic than his sister’s, flickering from commission to commission as a sort of artist. His reaction to his father’s passing was a simple text sent to his favourite living brother.

Allison Hargreeves found out in perhaps the cruelest way. Very early on in her youth she had become obsessed with the idea of fame, of acting and making a living making others’ stories come to life. She lived in California, as all good actresses should, with her husband Patrick and her two children, Claire and James.

She floated along the red carpet, a wooden smile carved into place upon her painted face, as she heard the news. Faceless flashes blinded her as voices called out until one broke through the sound.

“Allison, have you heard the news?” The voice had called. “When was the last time you saw your father?”

Her assistant finally got to her and she quickly walked away.

Diego Hargreeves was placing towels and cloths over the last of his doughs when the text came through from his brother. In their youth Diego had been one of the most violent and quick to anger of the siblings but as an adult he had found peace in baking, a career he had been encouraged to pursue by his girlfriend. Diego was well built and tan with hair cut short to his head and a thick scar running along his face towards his eye, for a baker he did not look like one to me messed with.

He read the text with a smile, biting into a doughnut he muttered “I hope you burn, father.”

Luther Hargreeves sat alone on the moon, as he had been for the past for years. He was a tall man, once handsome but now corrupted by the toxins that had saved his life, and so dreadfully lonely. He had no direct contact with another living being for four years but as the new cane to him of his father’s death he was somewhat relieved. He could not do research for a dead man. He mourned the loss of a father but was hopeful to come back down to earth.

**xxxxxxxxx**

Vanya arrived at the house by taxi the following day to find it exactly as she had left it twelve years before. It was as dim and lifeless as she had remembered, full of priceless ornaments that held no purpose and musty rugs and curtains that soaked up any natural light. It was an expensive hell.

She entered slowly, scared to disturb anyone or announce her presence. Vanya was well aware she would not be welcomed warmly after what she had done. _Good_, she thought, _they deserved it and far worse_.

She found her mother by the fire in the living room, as synthetically beautiful as ever. But her calling had the undesired effect of alerting her sister to her presence.

“Vanya?” Allison called, not unkindly. Of her living siblings Allison’s chapter had been perhaps the least cruel.

“You’re actually here.” So perhaps her sister was less okay with everything as she had first thought.

“Hey Allison.”

“Hey sis.” Allison approached her, lingering a few feet away as if debating whether to hit her or not, before pulling her into a very awkward hug. It was impersonal, almost clinical, as if Allison was just going through the motions that’d keep the peace.

“What is she doing here?” And just like that all sense of peace was gone. Diego walked in to the hall, dressed in black jeans and a soft black jumper which surprised his sister’s who had expected a police uniform or vigilante gear. “You don’t belong here. Not after what you did.”

“Diego.” Allison turned to her brother, her voice that of a weary mother. There was no defence of Vanya in that tone, Vanya noted, just that of someone who wanted to be done with it all as soon as possible.

The sisters watched as Diego stalked through and up the stairs, probably to get reacquainted with his childhood room. Or his brothers.

“You know, I uh-“ Vanya stumbled. _I’m a grown woman_, Vanya thought, getting ready to leave. _I don’t have to deal with their bullshit._ “Maybe he’s right-“

“Forget about him.” Allison said softly. “You have as much right as the rest of us.”

They lingered awkwardly for a few seconds before Allison walked away.

**xxxxxxxx**

“I can save you some time.” Diego entered the room where his brother stood, searching through their father’s room for any signs of foul play. It was strange seeing his brother again after so long, strange seeing any of his family outside of Klaus but seeing Luther was something else altogether. Gone was any bitterness he still held in regards to their childhood rivalry and all that was left was pity, pity for the one left behind.

Luther was far bigger than he remembered and also far clumsier but the looks of things. He looked strange, as if his whole body had been stuffed like a teddy bear and they had just forgotten to do the same for his head.

“They’re all locked, no false entry, no sign of struggle, nothing out of the ordinary.” He strolled into the room to lean against a cabinet, he wasn’t there to start a fight. Not this time.

“What do you want?” It’s a shame Luther didn’t hold the same sentiment.

“The autopsy report.” Diego held the crumpled paper out to his brother, tugging it away before actually handing it over. He may not be there to start anything but he couldn’t resist teasing.

“And you have this why?” Luther asked, skimming over the page.

“My girlfriend was in charge of his case when they still suspected something.” He couldn’t help but smile at the thought of Eudora. “And surprise surprise, dad’s death was normal. Just a boring old heart failure.”

“Yeah, so.” Luther asked, tense.

“So why are you in here,” he responded “checking all the windows?”

“Was she the first one on the scene?”

“Pogo found him.”

“Yeah I talked to Pogo.” Luther said, less tense this time as if he was getting used to his brother again. “He said he couldn’t find dad’s monocle.”

_Oh, shit_ thought Diego.

“And your point being?”

“Can you think of a single time you saw dad and he wasn’t wearing that monocle?”

“No.” Diego replied, reluctantly.

And so Luther launched into a theory about how that proved their father had been murdered. Diego had always believed it was childish pettiness that had led him to resent his brother, now he was starting to think it was his apparent love of conspiracies. Diego grew tired quickly and wished his brother good luck in his murder mystery, going to find his mum and maybe the missing monocle.

**xxxxxxxxxxxx**

To say Vanya was surprised when Pogo told her that their father had never read her book would be a lie. Whilst her siblings, or at least the two she had come across, obviously had she had no expectations that her father would do the same. That didn’t change the well of anger that bubbled up inside of her when she saw a mini shrine to her siblings, photos of her siblings at the height of the academy and not a sign of her existence anywhere in the house outside of her closet-sized bedroom.

Seeing Pogo again washed away a lot of the bad memories of the house. He had always been unendingly kind to her, slipping her treats and turning a blind eye to any of her rule breaking where he wouldn’t for any of the others. He seemed nostalgic when they discussed Five, whilst Vanya could feel the bitterness crawling through her bones.

**xxxxxxxx**

Klaus had heard the door open to his father’s study he just chose to ignore it. He had realised that he would look suspicious just on merit of being the family junkie in his father’s office, despite not having even drunk for the past four years or so. In fact he wasn’t looting the office, as tempting as that thought was, but rather searching through their father’s notes; if he found the ones on his powers he might finally get a good night sleep that wasn’t drug induced, four years of poor sleep was not good for the skin.

“Klaus.” Oh, Allison, great. “What you doing in here?”

“Oh, Allison,” Klaus breathed the words “Wow, is that you? Hey, come here.”

He pulled Allison into a light hug, barely touching her in fear she’d push him away but she didn’t just lightly hugged back for a second before they both pulled away.

“Long time. Too long.” He held her back as if to get a good look at her, his smile becoming less fake as she giggled at his antics. “Hey I was hoping to, uh, see you actually cuz... I was hoping to get your autograph added to my collection.”

Klaus upped the anti steadily. He was testing the waters, seeing where his different siblings’ lines were at for his bullshit. He long ago found that whilst Diego was with Eudora his was infinite but beyond makeovers and gossiping he could not remember Allison having a similar sort of patience with him.

“So what are you doing in here Klaus?”

“I just came down here to prove to myself that the old man was...really gone.” Klaus said, mock-sadly. “And he is! He’s dead! Yay!”

Allison rolled her eyes as Klaus danced around clapping and joking about their dad who had been dead for less than a week. She laughed at some of his jokes and drama, doubtlessly believing him to be drunk or high or both but nonetheless humouring him. Klaus was, dare he say it, touched.

“Get out of his chair.” Ordered Luther from the door.

“Oh, wow Luther.” Klaus stood, gesturing with his thin bare arms. “You really filled out.”

“Klaus.” Luther’s tolerance had apparently not changed in thirteen years.

“I- save the lecture. I was already leaving.” He headed towards the exit “You guys can, uh, talk amongst yourselves.”

Luther grabbed his collar. “Drop it.”

“Ex-squeeze me.” Oh, so that’s what he thought he was in their for. “From where?”

They both looked down at his slim waistcoat and skin tight leather trousers, his coat was hung on the rack in the hall with his shoes below it because he had manners unlike the rest of his heathen siblings. Just like that he was let go but not before his dear siblings started talking.

“So Klaus is still Klaus, in case you were wondering.”

Well wasn’t Luther sweet.

**xxxxxxxx**

They all sat in silence, the tension thick as custard. They were waiting for number one to start leading, or the funeral to start depending on which came first. Occasionally Diego and Klaus would exchange a look, a raised eyebrow between the only two who had stayed in contact, or Allison would take a drink from her glass. Beyond that the room was still and quiet.

“Um, I guess we should get this started. So I figured we could have our sort of memorial service in the courtyard at sundown.” Luther stood, taking control whilst Klaus fiddled in the bar making some strange mocktail. “Say a few words, just at dad’s favourite spot.”

Once again everyone became startlingly aware of the inequality they were treated with. Everyone looked blankly at Luther, the favourite child, who of course new their father beyond observations and training.

“Dad had a favourite spot?” Allison asked blankly.

“Yeah, y’know, under the oak tree.” He paused as everyone continued to look blank. “We used to sit under there all the time, none of you ever do that?”

Klaus interrupted, taking pity on his brother and chasing away any awkwardness with a quip about sandwich. The conversation quickly derailed into how he’d stole Allison’s skirt, which also begged the question of where was what he had on previously.

Luther quickly plunged into his conspiracies about their father’s death whilst the others tried to dissuade his theories. Luther asked Klaus to summon their dad but before he could begin to actually refuse and finish his, admittedly bullshit, excuses Allison was already accusing him of getting high. Luther went on about the monocle and how it proved them as suspects in their father’s death, causing Diego to storm off with Klaus close behind. Soon only Luther was left standing there, realising he’d messed up.

**xxxxxxxx**

A tremendous thunder-like sound shook the old mansion as blue light sparked as if in some sort of flash storm. The five siblings charged outside to see what had caused the ruckus only to find a huge ball of fluorescent energy sparking and spluttering.

“What is it?” Called Vanya.

“Don’t get to close.”

“Yeah, no shit.”

“It looks like some sort of temporal anomaly.” Luther said “Either that or a miniature black hole. One of the two.”

“There is a slight difference there, brother dear.” Klaus pointed out.

It began to splutter more dramatically causing the siblings to back away and for Luther and Diego to step in front of their less testosterone-fuelled siblings. It began to look like a figure was emerging from the vortex but before any of them could work out who or what it was the light closed up, leaving just a small figure in its place.

It was a young boy, about twelve or so, dressed in an oversized suit and with his dark hair in disarray. The child got to his feet at the others began to approach him, the sky cleared up so they could finally see his face all coming to the conclusion that the boy was...

“Does anyone else see little number five or is that just me?” Klaus asked.

“Shit.” Five said, looking down at himself.

**xxxxxx**

The siblings sat around the table as Five hopped around the kitchen making a sickly sweet sandwich. He explained how his consciousness had been projected through time into a far younger version of his body and how he had been sticking in the future for forty five years making him the oldest of his siblings whilst still looking thirteen.

Klaus had expected his brother to change in the time that he had been gone but he hadn’t seemed to. He was as blunt and sarcastic as he had ever been, though Klaus would admit he was a little harsher, a little rougher around the edges. Klaus saw the glint in his eye, the one he’d only ever seen on the faces of men in the streets when he was in deep shit. In his time away Five had begun to unravel.

The compliment on his attire was welcome though.

**xxxxxx**

Vanya was cautious when approaching her brother. It was strange seeing him again but she was worried too. All the rest of their siblings hated her, for speaking the truth about the abuse she had endured in a house where the only way to get by was with powers. If Five hated her too then she’d be distraught.

She doubted he would though. He had always been so nice to her and besides he was always the smartest so would probably be on her side, he’d see that they were being selfish and that what she had faced was way worse than what they could even begin to imagine.

“Nice to know Dad didn’t forget me.” Five said, still staring up at his portrait. His tone was neutral but Vanya had always understood him better than the others, to her he was smiling. He must of missed her as much as she missed him. “I read your book by the way. Found it in a library that was still standing. Ballsy, giving up the family secrets. Sure that went well.”

“They hate me.”

“You went too far.” This comment surprised her. Out of all of them she had been sure that Five would understand. “Especially what you said about Ben.”

That confused her further. She had been complimentary about Ben, never saying a word against him. He had been a good brother, led astray by Klaus sure, but always kind and welcoming. Before she could ask Five to explain he was gone.

She didn’t see anyone again till they were in the courtyard for the funeral. Luther tipped out the ashes and they landed with a thud on the wet ground. Vanya looked across at her siblings, taking in their reactions to the affair.

Five was neutral, as to be expected, whilst Luther looked a little bit upset but not greatly as Vanya had thought. Allison looked concerned at their mother but nothing more. Diego looked smug but also like a drowned rat, his delicate masculinity to fragile for an umbrella, Vanya narrowed her eyes slightly. She glared harder when her eyes turned to Klaus.

He stood in that stupid skirt that he had stolen like some sort of hobo, shivering in a thin coat that was once again made for a woman, holding that ridiculous pink umbrella like some sort of child playing dress up. This all coming to a head with his stupid cigarette because her brother couldn’t even be bothered to stay sober for their father’s funeral.

Vanya listened intently to Pogo’s words, enjoying his calm voice explain who he had known. She knew she wasn’t the only one listening so carefully. Luther was standing there probably agreeing with every word, she shook her head at her brother’s naivety. It still seemed rude when Diego cut across Pogo’s lovely speech with a comment that he knew would only end in an argument.

The destruction of Ben’s statue was awful, her stupid bull headed brothers had destroyed one of the only relics of their dead brother. The head tumbled away with a clang and Vanya gasped in pure horror at what her brothers had done. Klaus and Diego stood looking apathetic whilst the rest of them were rightfully shocked. Vanya could not stand to be out with the careless stupidity of her family so stormed in, hoping that Five would follow and she could catch up with one of the only people she could honestly say she still loved.

**xxxxx**

Pogo watched as Vanya stood alone in the entrance hall taking her pill. He was surprised she still took it, having read her book and finding little respect for the man who had placed her on it. It concerned him, somewhat, that she still had such a reliance on the pill despite her deteriorating mental state that had been clear to him in her book. It seemed Reginald had misjudged the long term effects of such a drug and that her powers being suppressed had begun to put pressure on her brain.

He walked in loudly, not wanting to surprise his most delicate charge.

“Don’t waste your time,” she said, resigned “Diego’s right, I shouldn’t have come.”

Despite half wanting to agree with the knife flinger Pogo said “This is your home and always will be. Should I get you a taxi?”

“I already called one but thanks.” A car beeped outside. “That’s me.”

“I hope you know your father loved you very much.” Pogo lied, hoping some positivity may help the girl in some small way. He also wouldn’t admit it but he was growing sick of all the abuse that was being aimed at his dear friend. “In his own way.”

“Yeah well, that’s kind of the problem isn’t it.” She mumbled. “Take care of yourself.”

“You as well miss Vanya.”

**xxxxx**

“Where’s Vanya?” Asked Allison, walking into the kitchen where Five was hunting through all the cupboards.

“Oh, she’s gone.” Klaus replied, hugging the guitar that Diego used to play. The annoyance of her druggie brother never failed to amaze Allison.

“That’s unfortunate.” Five said in a tone that made it clear it wasn’t.

“Yeah.” Allison agreed, coming to stand at the table.

“An entire square block, forty two bedrooms, nineteen bathrooms but no, not a single drop of coffee.” Five complained. It seemed shocking to Allison, her brother had never used to drink coffee but he complained about it in the exact way he used to complain about other things in their youth, like if there were no eggs left or they only had the cheap cereal.

“Dad hated caffeine.”

“Well he hated children too and he had plenty of us.” Klaus gave a painfully fake laugh.

Allison stood, unsure of how to respond to the bitterness of her brother. Klaus had never been harsh, careless and dark sure but in no way sardonic or cold. He had always been the most caring, ready to comfort or give physical contact in a way the others had never been but it seemed that being away from the academy had changed him. To Allison it seemed almost as if he was done with letting others treat him like shit, as if he had acknowledged how bad their childhood was in a way that only Five and Diego had in their youth, in the way that Allison herself was now only just working through (with the help of her therapist).

“I’m taking the car.”

“Do you even know how to drive?”

“I know how to do everything.” And with that he left.

“I feel like we should try and stop him,” Klaus got up as if preparing to do so, “But then again I kind of wanna see what happens.”

Diego entered, now wearing a coat and carrying Klaus’s. He turned to Allison and said “Alright, guess I’ll see you in what? ten years when Pogo dies.”

“Not if you die first.” Allison teased.

“Yeah, love you too sis.” He took a marshmallow. “Have fun playing housewife. Klaus, you ready to go?”

“Yeah, give Clare and James our love, sister dear.”

**xxxxxxxx**

“Has Ben been around?” Diego asked as they got in the car.

“No, he stayed home.” Klaus replied with a grin. “There was an all day Harry Potter marathon on ABC he wanted to watch, he’ll be happy to hear about the statue.”

“Good, you think you’ll be free to come for dinner tomorrow? Patch misses Ben, something about civilised conversation.” Klaus laughed and agreed to come round.

Diego knew Klaus would be suspicious but he still stopped at the dock to ditch the monocle, he knew that Luther’s suspicions would be far more annoying than his annoying brothers. He stood there for a few minutes, unsure. It was the last thing of his father’s that actually meant something, it was complicated. The hand that hits was also the hand that feeds, so do you bite, run or accept? Diego had never been sure.

He dropped Klaus off and declined the invite to come in for a coffee and a catch up with Ben but instead went home to the flat he shared with Patch, unsurprised that she wasn’t in yet despite her shift ending a half hour prior. He knew she’d be there in the morning when he got up to open the bakery and he knew she’d be free for dinner with Ben and Klaus. They saw less of each other after his career change despite living together but it was good, they had time together and were living the good life. Her mother came round regularly with pies and casseroles and Christmas was no longer the rigid affair it had been in his youth.

Diego was happy.

**xxxxxx**

In another universe Luther truly mourns his father, searching for answers to it all from the moon he was sent to. He resents it.

In this one he mourns who his father could have been but welcomes the love from his siblings. He misses the moon some days.

In another universe Diego is bitter and cold, with no one to return home to and nights spent saving those who the police could. He hasn’t seen his siblings since he was seventeen.

In this one he goes home to Patch and wakes up early to open his bakery where old ladies coo and call him a gentleman and a sweetheart. His brother has an open invitation to his house and was the one who named their pet cat.

In another universe Allison is divorced and not allowed to see her baby girl grow up. The man she loved had the locks changed.

In this one she has two beautiful children who are growing a little more everyday. The man she loves waits up for her return.

In another universe Klaus hasn’t been sober since he was thirteen and hasn’t had a home since he left his father’s. His dead brother is the only one who can stand to look at him.

In this one he manages the ghosts and the call of drugs from inside his crappy apartment. His fellow students tease him for being a teachers pet, despite already failing the course twice.

In another universe Five gets home to the past and a doughnut shop gets shot up. He then goes to his normal sister and tells her Armageddon is coming; she doesn’t believe him.

In this one the doughnut shop still gets shot up. He then goes to Klaus’s apartment as his sister’s book makes him scared but reading between the lines made him reconsider the others.

In another universe Ben has to watch his brother self destruct, unable to do more than nag from the sidelines.

In this one he has long conversations with his other brothers girlfriend about books and tv shows they like, he watches his brother fail but he also watches him try again anyway.

In another universe Vanya is okay, she teaches violin and her new student is older than the others, he smiles at her in a way no one ever has before. She says yes to a date.

In this one Vanya is not okay, she teaches violin and her students begin to quit. They tell their parents that Miss Vanya is scary, she grabbed their arms to hard or yelled to loud. No one asks her out, no one talks to her if they don’t have to. She starts to lose her grip.

A miscalculation was all it took, a number that hadn’t been carried mid way through and Reginald had messed up the suppression drug. A butterfly began to fly. A bat of the wings and Vanya wrote a book worse and more naive than what was possible before. Another and Diego picked up the book and decided to save his brother. Another and Five picked up the same book and a few more on mental health and child abuse, he studied and grew to fear his sister and want to save his other siblings. A bat of the wings of a butterfly and a hurricane did not begin turning but stopped. No books flew out of windows but a domino effect had begun.


	2. Dear God

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fun(eral) is over and life begins to get a tad stressful for our heroes  
Featuring love, self destruction and a morally ambiguous monkey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Much of this is lifted from the show and the format isn’t great (though I’ll edit soon) because I’m posting on an iPad not a laptop so I can really bold/italicise. It shouldn’t be too bad and sorry for being a few days late. I’ve had writers block and a bad month

_ **Those lost at sea and never found** _

_ **And it’s the same the whole world round** _

_ **-Dear God , XTC** _

* * *

Harold Jenkins had expected drawbacks from his plan, of course he had but this was something else entirely. He had imagined that things would go wrong but he had at least expected that the Umbrella Academy would be more interesting. They have done little but show up at the house and then leave when in fact he had expected more drama and for at least something that could benefit his plan. Instead he had stood outside and waited for nothing. Vanya, the sister with the book, seemed estranged from the rest but she was uninteresting, the rest could be useful but if they truly resented her as she believed then the girl was quite useless.

The junkie was the one that Harold liked his chances with, he could be the way into the academy and if Harold was lucky Klaus would be great at ripping the academy apart. The man, to Harold’s knowledge, had not changed since he was twelve. He was a childish junkie, just neglected enough to find love in any who would offer it and Harold was sure that he would easily charm the other man. Even if it did mean having to pretend to be a fairy.

xxxxx

Klaus could feels eyes staring at him all morning, he was unsure what it could be. He knew he was alone since Five had left early that morning, before Klaus had even woken, and only Ben remained in the apartment since he had learned how to get rid of the ghosts he didn’t want hanging around. He honestly just wanted to leave but knew that he had some commissions to be getting on with. After the day he had had previously he knew the work he got done would not be up to his usual standard however he felt useless just sitting there doing nothing.

Klaus was really just killing time until he felt it was appropriate to go back to the house. The house that he had been avoiding his entire life, the house he was raised in and the house he feared he would die in. What Five had revealed the night before added another bit of darkness to as it became clear that the father has known something, something he shouldn’t. Chalk and paint hit the paper in a flurry of movement, the noise in his mind finally shutting off as he released the darkness. Ben said it was an unhealthy coping mechanism but Klaus felt cleaner, lighter every time pen hit the page. Art felt like home in a way that his own house had never. To him it wasn’t a second language like English or German or Vietnamese or any of the many others he knew from the ghosts. To Klaus art was the first language, the one that his father had tried to stop his tongue from ever learning.

Despite Klaus’s belief in his brother the night before, and Ben’s silent approval of this support, Five had left early in the morning in a huff. For some reason his agreement to help had not been enough for Five, that or he was just going through puberty again. Klaus felt weird about the whole thing, he was hardly the best help for such a huge thing and when he raised that Five’s callous assessment of his uselessness was painful. Five still only knew him as a useless druggie, that’s all any of them but Diego knew him as and it wasn’t fair. He had changed, been changed for years but that still wasn’t enough for his family and most likely never would be.

xxxx

Patch wasn’t home yet.

Diego entered his empty house in a daze, half wishing he had invited Klaus to stay the night so that neither of them had to wallow in the complexity of their dead abusive father but he had felt optimistic. If Patch was home she’d know just what to say to cheer him up or comfort him or whatever he needed but she must have been on a case, she was over an hour late just when Diego needed her.

Instead he went into the kitchen, warming up some of last nights lamb curry in the microwave before turning the TV onto some mindless reality show; if Diego was entirely honest he was still tempted to call Klaus but he wasn’t sure if he could deal with his brother’s careless jokes and comments. As much as Diego loved Klaus he would be the first to admit that it had never been the drugs that had made him such a pain. Klaus was, and always would be, annoying.

“Diego?” Patch’s voice called through the apartment along with the sound of the door slamming shut. “Babe?”

“In here,” Diego called.

“How was it?” Patch sat next to him on the sofa, curling in towards him.

“Tell me about your day?” He felt pathetic deflecting but he just couldn’t go into the feeling of seeing his siblings after so long without crying, especially not Vanya.

“Pretty standard at first, just the normal thefts and Miss Dena calling about her mysterious stalker who is definitely not just her neighbour but the late case was interesting. Y’know the doughnut place heading out of the city?” Diego nodded “There was some sort of shoot out, never seen anything like it. These guys all in uniform shot up the place but it’s weird. Their bullets were out dated and they only killed each other.”

“No other casualties?”

“Not a soul.”

xxxxxxx

Luther woke up at the same time he always did, slipped on his thick heavy coat and made his way out of his room. It was strange being back at the house after four years, stranger still to know that his siblings may still be there - well some of them at least. He’d missed them all even though he felt he never truly knew them. In his youth he had spent his time chasing after Allison so he had neglected his other siblings and now he felt regretful.

He didn’t know how to talk to Diego calmly, didn’t know how his police career was going or if he was with anyone. He didn’t know how Klaus was, didn’t know if he still saw the ghosts or if the drugs had taken away what little power his weakest brother had had. He didn’t know anything about Five but then again none of them did. He didn’t know how Vanya’s violin was going, didn’t know what made her hate them enough to write that damned book. Worst of all, he hadn’t known Ben. Ben’s death had torn all of them apart but Luther hadn’t known his brother enough, didn’t know his favourite book or who he wanted to be when he grew up. Who Ben could have been but never would be.

He found only Allison.

“Hi.”

“Hey.”

“It’s funny,” said Luther, trying to start conversation “I’ve had the same routine for the last four years, now that I’m back down here I’m not quite sure what to do with myself.”

“I know the feeling.”

“You must be eager to see your family.” Luther smiled at the thought. He would love to meet Patrick and Claire and James, to see what a real family was and to see the ones his sister loved so much.

“Maybe some day, I’d really love for you to meet them.”

“Me?” Luther blinked in shock. He was monstrous, why would she want a freak like him around her family?

“Yeah, you.” She laughed. “Why not?”

“Do they even know about me?”

“Of course they know about you, you guys are the kids favourite bedtime story.” Allison laughed. “You’re Claire’s favourite but James can’t get enough of Klaus. Don’t tell him I said that.”

“Of course.” Luther smiled, trying to ignore the tears that were pooling in his eyes.

They kept talking for a while after that. Luther couldn’t help but soak up all he could about Claire and James, of the family that he would never had. He was surprised to hear that the marriage between Allison and Patrick had been rough for a while. After the catalyst of Vanya’s book Allison hadn’t trusted herself to be near Claire, seeing herself as only the selfish manipulator that Vanya painted her as. Patrick had believed Allison had started to resent their daughter and it wasn’t until they went into couples therapy that Allison had been able to deal with the book and her childhood. Luther found that as the conversation went on it became easier to not rush to defend dad. The stories Allison told showed him that they had been raised badly and whilst Luther thought it was for the greater good, he couldn’t deny that Claire and James’s childhood sounded far happier than his own.

xxxxxx

If Five was honest with himself he regretted leaving Klaus’ so early that morning. It wasn’t the nicest apartment by any means but there was something calming about the crapped colourful walls and the piles of books and canvases that seemed to be laying everywhere. Klaus’s apartment was not what he had expected but it was warm and cozy and welcoming.

Instead of soaking up that homey feel Five had missed for so long he was stuck dealing with idiots in an office block.

It was just weird being back after so much time, stranger still as his siblings had grown up without him. The only clues he had about how his siblings were had come from Vanya’s book and he knew from the stories he had been in that his sister did not remember things how they had actually happened. Some thing was very wrong with Vanya, she seemed unhinged in a way that she had never been. When she wasn’t talking directly to others her face would be completely blank or she’d be glaring daggers at his other siblings. His time at the commission and in the apocalypse did not suggest an issue with her mental state, she was insignificant. Five vowed he’d try to help his sister later. Stopping the end of the world came first.

And to stop the end of the world he needed to figure out what ever the hell was going on with the eye that Luther’s corpse had been clutching, the one thing that had kept him sane through all the years.

“Uhh, can I help you?” Asked a middle aged man in a suit.

Five turned and answered “Do you know who this belongs to?”

“Where dis you get that?”

“What do you care?” The man looked taken aback. “I found it, at a play ground actually, um, must of just popped out. I wanna return it to its rightful owner.”

The woman at the desk cooed. “What a thoughtful young man.”

Five struggled not to snap at her.

“Yeah, look up the name for me will you?”

“Uhh.” Interjected the suit. “I’m sorry but patient records are strictly confidential. That means I can’t tell you-“

“Yeah” Five cut across. “I know what it means”

“But I’ll tell you what I can do, I will take the eye off your hands and return it to the owner. I’m sure he or she will be very grateful so if I could.”

That’s where things went south. Fast. Five lost his temper and it quickly turned to a rather unsuccessful threat that Five knew was pointless. What did it matter? He’d never find the owner to the eye. Little did he know that the days in which the owner mattered were long gone . Vanya was to insane now and the man had another victim to be his.

Five hadn’t wanted to ask Klaus for help again but the world rarely worked how Five wished for it to. Which is how he found himself back at the offices talking to the same idiot he had just hours go but this time with his erratic brother raring to help. Whilst it was obvious to Five that Klaus was sober it was also obvious the man wasn’t all there. It seemed to be a theme among the Hargreeves siblings. It’s almost as if rampant child abuse isn’t conductive to tasing productive members of society, Five mused as his brother introduced himself.

“Like I said to your son earlier, any information about the prosthetics we build is strictly confidential. Without the clients consent I simply can’t.” The manager said.

“Well the client can’t consent if you don’t give us a name.” Five was steadily growing more frustrated. He had been convinced that by bringing Klaus as a guardian figure they would relent but apparently they valued their contracts far more than most companies; that or they were hiding something.

“It’s not my problem.” The man muttered. “Sorry, now there’s really nothing more I can do so-“

“What about my consent?” Klaus cut across.

“Excuse me.” Five looked at his brother confused. He remembered this tone of voice. This was the tone that Klaus used to use whenever he was about to do something mental.

“Who gave you permission to lay your hands on my person?” Klaus’s voice cracked towards the end with obviously fake tears.

“What?” Five and the man asked in unison.

“You heard me.”

“I didn’t touch you.” Just like that Five caught on. Oh, god Klaus.

“Oh really, well how did I get this swollen lip?”

Five looked at Klaus for a second and wondered why his brother felt he had to take on the whole of the blackmail role. Why was he not using Five?

“You don’t have a swollen lip.” The man began to sound agitated and Five just preyed his brother wouldn’t hurt himself too bad.

Klaus walked his face onto the corner of the table, blood gushed down his chin just second latter. Five stood, staring in shock at his brother who barely knew what this was about. Oh god, he really should have bought Diego.

“Name please, now.”

“You’re crazy.” The man was a few shades paler than he had been, Five was half sure he’d be the same.

“You got no idea.” Klaus laughed. He then reached for the snow globe on the desk. “Peace on Earth’ That’s so sweet.”

A second later Five found himself recoiling in shock at more blood dropped down his brother’s face.

Five knew he wasn’t fully okay but something about Klaus’s complete lack of self preservation scared him. It was as if Klaus was just viewing himself as a tool to be used and disposed of in Five’s plan. Five swore then that if they all survived the next week or so he would do whatever he could to help Klaus. The man may not have been on drugs but his issues seemed far from over. The prison comment did not escape the time traveller either.

In fairness to Klaus his plan worked.

xxxxxx

Allison put down the phone with a sigh. She was trying to get Patrick to fly Claire and James over so they could meet their uncles but Patrick didn’t want them near or all the family drama especially so soon after the funeral. Allison had been trying for a good twenty minutes but hadn’t managed to wear him down. It didn’t develop into an actual argument (they hadn’t had one of those since before they went to couples therapy) but it was a close call. Patrick was just worried about the kids getting hurt whilst Allison knew her brothers would do anything to protect her kids, even if their ideas about what is and isn’t child appropriate was some what twisted.

Allison couldn’t help but smile at the thought of Luther making dens with Claire and play fighting with James, of Diego teaching them how to bake or reading them stories with all the voices, of Klaus playing dress up with the pair, and of Five teaching them all sorts of facts that were so strange they were their own entertainment.

“Are you okay?” Vanya interrupted Allison’s musings. She thought the urge to wince at the sight of the sister who was the reason for her husband’s hesitation.

“Yeah.” Allison replied, harsher than intended.

“Well I’ve never met your husband but sounds like an asshole.” Vanya said. “You know what he’s probably better off there.”

“No, we’re probably better off as a family.”

“Really?” Despite the quiet tone Vanya’s voice had a clear edge of malice.

“If I wanted advice, Vanya, no offence it wouldn’t be from you.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Vanya sounded hurt but Allison still couldn’t shake the edge that her sister’s voice held.

“You’ve never been in a relationship.”

“That’s not true.”

“It is, you separate yourself from everyone and everything you always have and then you turn around and blame that on us?”

“Because Dad made me.” Allison resisted the urge to laugh.

“Did Dad make you write that book about us too?” Allison began to walk away but then turned. “You’re an adult now Vanya, you don’t get to blame your problems on anyone but yourself.”

xxxxx

Klaus just needed a walk to clear his head. Not of glass, Five had been surprisingly gentle with helping him get that out, but of the thoughts that he was stuck with. The world was ending in a week and what did he have to show fo it? Sure he had a stable(ish) job and his own place, in fact he was doing better than he ever had but his only friends were his colleagues and his brother. He had never been in a real relationship since getting clean despite his best efforts, the one he had that came closest had ended in Patch arresting the woman on charges of assault but he didn’t like to think about that. He was lonely and felt even more isolated as he was the only one Five had explained the full ‘end of times’ thing to.

So he went out.

He wasn’t going anywhere specifically and had no cash on him to even consider doing anything really but just being out of his flat or the old mansion was enough in itself. He had a lot to think about.

“Hey, I think you dropped this.” A voice called from behind him. Klaus turned to see a man about his age smiling at him. The man was short, about Vanya’s height but fairly stocky. He had a kind face and his smile reached his eyes easily. The man was holding up Klaus’s key.

“Oh, thank you.” Klaus grinned at the man.

“Hey, I uh, don’t usually do this but do you uh, want to get a coffee?” The man asked shyly. Klaus’s face lit up.

“Sure, I’m Klaus.”

“Leonard.” The man smiled again.

The coffee shop Leonard took his to was quiet, not one that Klaus frequented but it was small and cute. Klaus couldn’t help but think it suited the man. They sat awkwardly for a few minutes, shy in the beginnings but soon started talking about art. It was an easy topic for Klaus to fall into with the man as he found out the man made wooden sculptures but conversation moved quickly between them as they traded anecdotes and jokes like old friends.

“So tell me about your family?” Klaus asked, interested in finding out what a normal childhood was like.

“Uh, it was just me and my dad growing up, I mean my grandma was around a lot but my mum died when I was a kid so it was pretty lonely. I have no siblings and neither did either of my parents so I was a pretty lonely kid.”

“Oh trust me, having siblings doesn’t change that.”

“Oh? Do you have many?” Leonard asked, leaning forward a bit.

“Too many darling.” Klaus purred, placing his hand on the others arm. “Do you remember that Umbrella Academy?”

“The comic book thing? Vaguely.” Klaus fought the urge to cheer at the nonchalance with which Leonard replied. “Wasn’t there that book out a few years back?”

“Yeah, well you’re looking at number 4.”

“No way?” The man sounded shocked and a little impressed. “What power did you have?”

“Ghosts.”

“Oh.” Klaus tried to cover the flinch at Leonard’s disappointment, mentally kicking himself Klaus changed the subject. Of course Leonard was disappointed, everyone was when they found out that the only member of the academy they met was the druggie look out.

As the conversation changed again Klaus leaned back into the flirting and teasing they had been doing before. Leonard was so sweet and Klaus felt the coffee date had gone really well. As he left he gave Leonard the address to his flat and the academy whilst Leonard told him where the shop was , the hug they shared as they left wasn’t even awkward.

xxxxx

“Ah, Miss Allison.” Pogo’s voice came from the door way. Allison wasn’t quite sure why she rushed to put out her cigarette. “I was looking for you.”

“How did you, uh, how did you know I was up here?”

“It wasn’t hard, this is always where you used to come when you were upset.” Allison was unaware that Pogo was aware of that. He had never came after her in her youth.

“Who told you I was - Luther.”

“Actually, it was Miss Vanya.” Snitch. “She called me to make sure you were okay.”

They stood in silence for a beat too long, as if Pogo had expected her to address the mention of her sister.

“Come with me. I want to show you something.” Pogo relented after another few seconds. “It might just cheer you up.”

Something turned out to be tapes.

Tapes of their childhood, or what could have been their childhood. Pogo was right the videos helped. She missed her kids of course but watching herself as a child play around with her brothers, especially Ben, was a treasure. She didn’t think it was a coincidence that Pogo was showing her the happier times in their youth. She also couldn’t help but feel it wasn’t a coincidence that the only video she saw of Vanya was her practice time.

As a child they had asked Vanya to play with them often enough, not as much as each other perhaps but if they were doing something as a whole group she was always invited. It was hard though, their sister had not had the same exposure to the abuse as they had. She was also absent in a way the rest weren’t. Sure she’d smile and laugh when it was appropriate but Allison would admit she often feared her sister. Too often she had seen the small girl staring at nothing with completely dead eyes.

Pogo handed her the keys and left her too the rest of the videos of their childhood, all of which were meticulously sorted and in pristine condition. Allison noticed, however, a single video out of place. It was hidden away on top of the monitors like a beacon screaming at her to watch it and as she did she knew why.

xxxx

And so we press on as more mysteries uncover themselves.

We leave the seventh day till the apocalypse with the recovery of a video and a mannequin, with the start of a family meal and a relationship, with a look to the past and future and with the end of a kindly man’s life at the hands of an organisation hell bent on taking everything from everyone.

We leave Luther ready to love and defend.

We leave Diego ready to feed his found family.

We leave Allison ready to reveal the truth.

We leave Klaus ready to start something new.

We leave Five woefully unready.

And we leave Vanya, quickly and hopefully unharmed by her ever slipping sanity.

Ben watches on, the mostly silent guardian ready for his brother to clear his own name so he can reunite with his siblings from the other side of the veil.

And still the commission stands separated, unaware of the miscalculation that has already set into motion the undoing of their dastardly plots.

But the question still remains of if the world will still stand by the end of the week.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is three days late but also this month has been hell.  
Why September was bad (a list so I can vent): school started, a girl in my year died, I sprained my ankle, I’m stressed, homework, annoying siblings, drinking every night for a week, homework, pain, migraines, my boss, bad weather. I could go on.  
Hopefully the next chapter will be out in less than a month but probably not.


	3. Bullet with Butterfly Wings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Truths are revealed and bad things happen...also a kinda cute flash back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for not updating in time. This will probably continue. But hey I’m deviating from the show from now on. Also I got MCR tickets so I’m hyped af.

**Then someone will say what is lost can never be saved**   
**Despite all my rage I am still just a rat in a cage**

**Now I'm naked, nothing but an animal**  
**But can you fake it, for just one more show?**  
**\- Smashing Pumpkins**

* * *

_  
My name is Vanya Hargreeves and this is my story._

_We were never a real family, we were our father’s creation. Family in name but not in fact. In the end after our brother Ben had died there was really nothing connecting us. We were just strangers living under the same roof, destined to be alone, starved for attention, damaged by our upbringing and haunted by what might have been. We all wanted to be loved by a man incapable of giving love, our father never missed an opportunity to remind me that I was ordinary. A hard thing for a little girl to hear. If you’re raised to believe nothing about you is special and the bench mark is extraordinary what do you do if you’re not?_

**Xxxxx**

Vanya’s day was already bad before she had gone to rehearsals. She had missed her bus and had had to speed walk, her meds had run out and she didn’t have time to dig around for her back up or call for an appointment and her least favourite socks were the only ones left in the draw. All in all it had been a pretty crap day before she stepped into the theatres bathroom. This was perhaps why she just felt resigned when she saw Helen in the bathroom.

“Helen,” Vanya started awkwardly. “You were great today.”

Helen kept fixing her hair.

“Really, really great.”

“Thanks” came the short reply from the taller woman.

Vanya began to stutter over her words, unsure how to proceed with the other violinist.

“Make it look easy?” Helen cut her off, finally turning to look at her. “What’s your name again?”

“Vanya.” She replied, getting just a bit pissed off.

“Vanya,” Helen repeated. “And how many years have you been stuck at third chair? At a certain point it’s not about practice, it’s whether you’ve got something special and maybe you just don’t.”

Special. That word that had haunted her for years, never special among such special siblings. Never special enough for a man’s attention. Never special enough for anything more than third chair. Never special enough to be treated with care and kindness. Never special enough for her name to even be remembered by a woman she had known for years. Never special enough.

After this conversation Vanya Hargreeves put down the violin for the very last time. Just like that what either side knew of the apocalypse was buried forever, buried by an inevitable conversation but with a very evitable sanity. The plans constructed on both sides was slipping.

Unfortunately so was hope for Vanya Hargreeves.

**xxxxxx**

Diego arrived home that morning to see Allison and Luther conspiring once again. It was a habit that they had picked up in there youth that had apparently not faded through their time apart. He knew it’d just be more apocalypse talk which was something he wished to avoid. He’d just got his siblings back after all these years and all they wanted to talk about was the end of times? Yeah, thanks but no thanks.

“Anyone want any coffee?” He asked instead. They both accepted the offer and five minutes later they were all sat around the living room awkwardly. They hadn’t been family for over ten years and even when they had he had not been close with those either side of him in ranking. There was too much bad blood there.

“Anyone seen Five?” Diego broke the silence.

“Yeah, I think he’s upstairs,” Allison theorised “Probably seeing if maths can save the world.”

“He really hasn’t changed, has he?”

“No but you seem to have.” Luther pointed out. Diego fidgeted awkwardly for a second before shrugging.

“I suppose, half a decade of peaceful domesticity will do that.” He turned to his sister, “You get it don’t you Al?”

“True, so what have you been doing all this time Diego? Last I heard you dropped out of the police academy.”

“I, uh, opened a bakery?” He didn’t mean for it to sound like a question. “Moved into an apartment with a girl I met at the academy, it’s been good.”

“A bakery?” Allison asked incredulously. “That’s not the Diego I remember.”

“I always liked to help mom’s cooking, it’s not my fault you were to bust with curious George over here to notice.”

“Hey!” Luther protested. “Well, uh, back to business, Allison found something that may help with dad’s case.”

“God Luther, can’t you just leave things alone. There is no case.” And with that their peace was shattered and Diego stormed out.

**xxxxxxx**

Klaus didn’t know why he found himself outside of Leonard’s shop. He’d only seen the man the previous day but something about him drew Klaus in, perhaps it was his lack of interest at the academy or perhaps it was how normal the man was but either way he found himself outside of the quaint little wood store.

“Klaus!” The man exclaimed in greeting as he approached. Klaus grinned, it was really nice to hear someone other than his brothers be happy to see him. He noticed that Ben too was grinning at the short man’s greeting. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m ahead at work and thought I’d come Grace you with my presence.”

“Well, since you’re here you might as well come in.”

Leonard led Klaus through a maze of trinkets and treasures, intricate little carvings that had Klaus going crazy with trying to admire every single one. All the art around him was almost enough to make him ignore the tall, fat ghost that lingered on the edge of his vision, screaming and cursing like there was no tomorrow (though if Five was right, there may not be). He followed Leonard into a back room where the items shifted from antiques to woodwork.

“You made all these?” Klaus asked in awe. “They’re beautiful.”

“Thanks, I, uh, got into the hobby as a kid. Escapism and all that but then I never really outgrew it.”

“No, they’re wonderful.” Klaus said, smiling softly. “You could sell these, become a real artist.”

“Unfortunately being an artist doesn’t pay the bills.” Leonard replied, bashfully.

Klaus suppressed a wince. It was stupid for him to take offence at an offhand comment like that, he wasn’t even sure he had told Leonard that’s what he did. The comment wasn’t aimed at him or anything but he couldn’t help but feel hurt. In his periphery he saw Ben reach out for him as if to comfort.

“Oh, you have to see this one.” Leonard came over with a small statue. It was a tall, skinny man holding a Ouija board, it curved gracefully and looked almost ethereal in the dark wood the carving had been done in.

“Oh.”

“Do you not like it?” Leonard asked sounding embarrassed.

“No, no. It’s beautiful.”

“Have it, I made it for you.” He extended the statue and Klaus took it carefully.

“Thank you.”

**xxxxxx**

It was Allison who called up her wayward siblings to discuss their mom. She and Luther had calmed down Diego enough to get Klaus’s number off of him and then Allison had found Vanya’s work line in the yellow pages. She didn’t want to think about why none of them just had their sisters number. That’d mean thinking about the book and their childhood, there was too much history there. Unsurprisingly Five had been difficult to find. In the end Allison gave up and let Luther drag him out of whatever whole he’d crawled into.

They all ended up gathered round the tiny screen as the tape showed their mother, the woman who had all but raised them for as long as they could remember, kill the tyrant they called dad. Well, that’s what Luther would have you believe. In fact all it revealed was the missing monocle.

“If he was poisoned it would have shown in the coroners report.” Diego broke the silence that had descended over the siblings.

“Yeah, well I don’t need a report to tell me what I can see with my own eyes.” Said Luther

“Maybe all that low gravity in space messed with your vision,” Diego fiddled with the TV. “Look closer. Dad has his monocle, mum stands up, monocles gone.”

“Yeah.” Klaus giggled out. To his siblings who didn’t know better he probably sounded high.

“She wasn’t poisoning him she was taking it to clean it.”

“Then where is it?” Luther asked, sounding every bit the lost child he still was. “I’ve searched the house including all of her things, she doesn’t have it.”

“That’s because I took it from her.” Diego paused. “After the funeral.”

“You’ve had the monocle this whole time?” Allison questioned. “What the hell Diego?”

“Give it to me.”

“He dropped it in the river,” Klaus mimed dropping something. “Plop.”

“Mom was programmed to intervene if someone’s life was in danger.” Vanya piped up and Diego flinched at the words. Trust his psycho sister to say the literal worst thing she could possibly say in any situation. People always assumed it was him and Luther who were the shit stirrers, or perhaps even Klaus with all his gossip but Diego had noticed Vanya’s particular hobby of piping up right when he needed her not to.

“If her programming is deteriorating then we need to turn her off.”

Oh shit.

In another universe the votes are tied, stuck until Five comes home to make a decision. This is not that universe. Five votes to save their mother, as does Diego and Klaus but unfortunately in this universe Vanya does not love her mother. In this universe Vanya has too much anger to love any of them. The silent observer knows the love that her brother holds for the machine more human than anyone else who raised them and decides to break his heart.A draw should also call for stalemate and in most houses it would.

The Hargreeves are not most families.

Vanya takes a draw as permission and so their mother is gone far more quickly than Diego would accept and for more harshly that Luther could justify. They notice she is gone three hours after the fact. They never get the chance to find her.

Diego last words to her were to ask how long she’d been watching them discuss her fate.

“Was it her, or was it really dad?”

And with those simple words Vanya had doomed herself. Diego had one sister. Vanya had messed up just once too many times and Diego was done. Allison was his only sister. Vanya was a ghost, less tangible than those that stalked Klaus yet somehow more horrifying. She was gone. And so were her pills.

**xxxxxx**

It all went to shit when Hazel and Cha-Cha arrived.

Five was long gone at this point but the rest had remained. Luther was on the roof looking up at the moon, the simpler world he’d left behind, Allison had joined him and the two caught up staring up at the night sky. Diego had been searching for their mother whilst Klaus took a bath, leaving Ben incorporeal but in front of the tv. Vanya sat in her room.

The fight from the other universe remain mostly the same. It only differed in Vanya not leaving her room, she stayed still among the chaos as if reflecting herself. Inside she was a whirling mess but outside she was the same shy girl she had always been.

Perhaps worst of all is that they still took Klaus. In this world he was not weakened by drug abuse, his ghosts could manifest and he could (to some extent) control them. He fought dirty. Bitchy like a school girl and just as fierce. The man was all nails and trick shots but Hazel was massive. Klaus went down. Klaus went down ugly.

**xxxxx**

Diego paced back and forth. Three siblings had gathered in the living room but Diego was tense. He had yet to see Klaus or his mom and as rude as it was they were his priority. Both were vulnerable in their own ways and he had watched Klaus grow in the past few years from a hopeless druggie to a brother worth being proud of. His mother had gotten him through his childhood when no one else could, when no one else would have tried. Yet it was them who were missing.

“Diego?” Allison asked.

“Where’s mom? Where’s Klaus?”

Allison shook her head before placing it in her hands.

“Mom’s gone like we agreed.” Vanya replied calmly. “And it’s Klaus, he’s always off getting high.”

“What the hell Vanya?” Allison kept to her feet. “We didn’t settle on anything with mom.”

“Sure we did.” Vanya smiled slightly. “Everything was agreed on.”

“Klaus isn’t out getting high. He’s missing.” Diego hissed.

“It’s Klaus, Diego.” Vanya replied like it was obvious. “He’s always been too weak to stay sober.”

Diego growled, pulling a knife and pointing it at the short woman.

“Klaus didn’t work hard for years to stay sober for you to say shit like that.” Diego jabbed his knife towards her. “Get out.”

“What- but-“ Vanya stuttered “Allison-“

“I think you should go.” Allison interrupted.

**xxxxxx**

For as long as Allison can remember the dynamics between her and her siblings had been constantly shifting. She knew that from Vanya’s book it had seemed like it’d been all of them and then her as separate entity but that had been simply not true. The siblings had always shifted favourites from year to year and when they were little kids it had shifted from week to week. This meant that at some point or another each one had been her favourite sibling.

The earliest example she could remember was playing dolls with Vanya back when they were very young. They’d sworn they were best friends against the evil force of the gross boys, Klaus and Luther who had just discovered the joys of worms and dirt. At that point in time Diego and Five hard been off practicing their powers constantly and Ben was more interested in reading than in any personal contact.

“Promise we’ll be the bestest friends forever and ever.” She remembered demanding her sister.

“And ever and ever.” Vanya had promised, sealing their promise with their pinkies.

That had lasted up until they were about seven and Vanya had begun to spend all her time with Five and Ben in their super secret book club. At this point Allison had become best friends with Diego and Klaus with whom she’d gossip and paint nails with, complaining with Klaus about how Diego always chose black or clear. At that point Luther was more concerned with being Number One and training so grew close to Five when he wasn’t reading.

“Yellow is so not your colour Al,” Diego had said to her. “Go for emerald, everyone knows you good in green.”

It seemed laughable now, how the three of them could all sit around trading secrets and nail polish as if they were normal kids and not kids being trained to fight evil.

Just as Allison and Luther began to get close, around the time of puberty, Diego and Vanya bonded over music. Allison still remembered their punk band, The Prime-8’s, and how bad they had been. A drummer and a violinist does not a band make. This was the same time that Five and Klaus became the close, an unexpected bond that lasted up to the day Five left. Allison had never been sure what it was the two had bonded over but for a few years they had gone around as a trio, kindly letting Ben tag along even though it was clear that it was the Klaus and Five show.

The longest lasting friendships had been between Luther and Five, who bonded over their planning for missions, and the even-numbered siblings. Even during times when the rest of the friendships were happening or splitting off these seemed to last. Diego, Klaus and Ben’s seemed to be built on a dumb sense of humour. The puns and innuendos that they were all victim to when the three even siblings came together was a thing of legend but Allison had a feeling it went deeper than that. It was the only friendship that was strengthened by Five’s disappearance.

The most distinctive memory of their youth in Allison’s mind was when they decided who was oldest and who was youngest. The problem with all being born on the same day was that there shouldn’t be an oldest or youngest but their father had gone away to some distant country for a few days with some old friends of his and they were left with a freedom they were not yet used to. It was a memory that Vanya had detailed in her book but one that they had seemed to remember very differently.

They’d all sat around the living room with cups of hot chocolate that were comedically big in their small twelve year old hands. A storm raged outside and the lights flickered periodically but the whole room felt calm and welcoming. Allison remembered Ben and Klaus flinching on occasion from the noise but neither seemed too scared, she knew storms had always been bad for the two (she assumed it was linked to their powers).

“I’m Number One so I have to be the oldest.” Luther had pouted and Diego had scoffed at him, the twos rivalry was just developing.

“Are you suggesting that Five is younger than Klaus?” Ben asked incredulously.

“Well...uh...” Luther hung his head in defeat.

“Excuse me, I am perfectly grown up.” Klaus acted offended, the effect had been somewhat ruined by the unicorn toy he was cuddling. Allison knew she hadn’t actually laughed at him but it had been a close call. It was the memory of him she wished she still held, back when the worst he’d do was drink after he disappeared a few days. Some nights Allison still cried about all the memories of her sweetest brother that had all been tarnished by his addiction. She knew that if James grew up to be anything like Klaus had been as a child she’d be the proudest mother. She hated that at the time she’d seen him as weak.

“I think Five is the oldest.” Allison had cut in.

Even Luther had reluctantly agreed to that.

“Well, who’s the youngest?” Diego asked.

“Klaus.” Five, Ben and Luther had all replied in unison, ignoring his loud squawk of disagreement.

“It’s true, you’re the one we always have to look out for.” Allison said.

“Yeah, and you’re the nicest.” Ben had agreed.

“I think you’re forgetting about yourself there Benny.” Klaus argued.

“You’re the weakest.” Luther had said, not even thinking about how that sounded. “Dad always says so.”

“Am not!” Klaus’ face was red by that point, Allison couldn’t tell if he was mad or embarrassed by the almost insults, almost compliments he was getting. “Vanya is weaker than me.”

“Yeah but she’s ordinary.” Luther replied.

By the end of the night they had it figured out (with a lot of arguing, and violence in Diego and Luther’s case) and had agreed that Five was oldest then Allison, Luther, Diego and Vanya before finally Ben and Klaus. Looking back on it Allison was pretty sure it was just the order in which she and Five wanted to protect them. Despite the monsters inside Ben he was such a sweet kid she just wanted him safe. Vanya had disagreed.

_One stormy night we decided to agree on an age order for us. The problem with having siblings all the same age is that you can never know who the older brother figure is or who is the baby of the family will be. Surprisingly our esteemed Number One stood down for once and let someone else get first place. Our respect for Five let him have the title of oldest, This was probably the first and last time I had agreed with all our siblings. Five was always more mature than the rest of us. He was the only one who could look past my lack of powers and treat me like I mattered._

_Klaus was agreed to be the baby. I couldn’t tell if it was because my siblings genuinely believed he needed looking after or if he was playing up to a role for attention but I could help but disagree. Klaus was not the baby of the family, at this point he probably had more real life experience than the rest of us. He was sneaking out late and coming home high as a kite. I seemed to be the only one making a guess at how he was getting money for that. Our brother, the baby or the whore._

_I was forgotten to the end, as I often was at this time. I was deemed the third youngest. A middle child, so perfectly forgotten, not young enough to be cute or protected_

Now their baby brother was missing and their oldest had come back as a child and their sweetest brother had been dead since they were seventeen. It was all fucked. Allison was scared, she wanted to go home and hug her kids close but she couldn’t do that. Klaus was in trouble and Diego was determined to find him. She knew he could just be off getting high somewhere but a stronger part of her knew that if there was a chance that Diego was right and she had ignored him then she’d never forgive herself. She didn’t know why Diego was so sure of the strength of Klaus’s character but when she looked at him she still saw the little boy with wild hair and the kindest smile. If what Diego said was true and Klaus was sober he could be in some serious danger.


	4. Landslide

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Diego and Allison search for their lost brother whilst Harold plots and Five watches his plans crumble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for torture and homophobia (two separate things, don't worry Hazel and ChaCha are not homophobic). If you need any other tw then just comment and I’ll add them.

_ **But time makes you bolder** _  
_ **Even children get older** _  
_ **And I'm gettin' older, too** _

* * *

Allison was tired. It felt like since the funeral her whole life had been on full speed ahead and she hadn’t had a moment to call her family or take any time for herself. Everything was completely fucked and she hadn’t heard her daughter’s voice in way too long. But of course that couldn’t even be her priority because Klaus was missing and Diego was freaking out like crazy. 

“No, seriously these guys are dangerous.” Diego was speaking on the phone to god knows who. “Yes I know you can handle yourself but that doesn’t change that we have no leads.”

A pause.

“Yeah, thanks. Love you too.” Allison and Luther exchanged a look. Oh how times had changed. They’d heard their brother speak about his girlfriend but it was a shock to the system to hear Diego actually be affectionate for once.

“Ok,” Diego turned to the pair. “Patch said she has the police on look out but not actively searching for these guys and for Five.”

“I’ll go out looking for Five.” Luther said, obviously desperate to be out doing something. “Maybe he’ll know something about the guys who took Klaus.”

“Thanks.” Diego nodded. Allison hid a smile, she would have never thought that one day her two brothers would get on like this but both had calmed down in each other’s absence.

Within the hour Allison and Diego were driving around in her car trying to find any sign of the two masks who’d taken their brother. Diego had been checking his phone every two minutes, probably looking for updates from his police girlfriend, whilst Allison drove around the city slowly looking at every crevice trying to find any signs. As the day wore on she couldn’t help but feel more and more panicked, _what if they were too late to save Klaus? What if they had already skipped town and taken him with them?_ As she pondered what horrible thing could be happening to him she could feel her chest getting tighter. Her breathing picked up as she tried to stop herself from imagining the horrors her brother could be going to. _Oh my god_, she thought, _what if he’s dead?_ she couldn’t bear the thought of losing another brother. Klaus was so vital that it was nearly impossible to imagine him as anything other than completely performative. Tears began to well up in her eyes and Allison clutched at her chest. Klaus had to be okay.

“Hey, hey Allison look at me okay?” Diego was suddenly there taking her hand softly. “You need to breathe. Just copy me, in and out. Yeah, like that. You’re okay, Klaus is going to be fine.”

Slowly Allison began to breathe normally again to the steady stream of reassurances. She relaxed back into the car seat and tried to stop her thoughts from spiralling again. Diego pressed a tissue into her hand and turned to the window to let her sort herself out in some mimicry of privacy.

“Thank you.” Allison murmured. “Where did you learn to-”

She gestured vaguely.

“Deal with panic attacks?” Diego finished. “Patch gets them if she’s on a particularly stressful case. Some of the things she has to see are pretty brutal.”

“Oh. How long have you two been together?”

“Since I was on the same training programme as her, she convinced me to quit actually.”

A pause.

“Do you really think he’s going to be okay?”

“Of course, he’s Klaus.”

Diego was, predictably, entirely wrong.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

Klaus hadn’t actually realised until he was denied water for the tenth hour that he had managed to catch a cold. He could go that long without water usually but midway through the most recent torture session he felt like his throat was on fire. What he wouldn’t give for a little water based torture just to lubricate his throat a little. Instead he was in a motel room getting whipped in a way that was very much not sexy. The woman was stood behind him going crazy on his back whilst the big guy was out doing god knows what. He couldn’t help but half miss the guy, if the ghosts were to be believed (and they were, the dead found little point in lying) he was the nicer of his two capturs. 

“Just tell me where Five is and this can all be over.” the woman demanded again, Klaus couldn’t see the sense in it. His answer still hadn’t changed, the only thing that was lessening was his energy and pain tolerance. 

“I don’t know, he just left okay!” Klaus exclaimed, his voice coming out gravelly. “Please, just let me go. I don’t know anything!”

Back when he’d been a kid Daddy-dearest had decided that he and Vanya needed torture training, both in performing and resisting it. Reginald had gone wild explaining all the ways they could expect someone to gather information from them and all the ways that they could resist it. They’d been taught what order people tortured people in and why and how to block out the pain and give little bits of unimportant information in order to get out and clear. They were even taught what type of information was worth sacrificing. The two had been very good at it and it was one of the only times Klaus could remember Reginald being proud of him. Unfortunately the reason that Klaus had been so good at it at the time was that he was off his face on ketamine. Who knew horse tranqu was a good way of resisting pain?

Then Klaus got sober and he found that he couldn’t take pain like he used to. Now every stubbed toe felt like agony and the past few hours were nothing short of hell. He had got a bit better than when he first got clean but the great thing about drugs was that he got used to never feeling a thing.

When the man returned the two masks went off into the bathroom. Klaus tried to savour the lack of brutal torture but couldn’t help but pay more attention to the vague sounds of the two bickering, that was interesting. That was very interesting. If he could get one of them to betray the other, or at least argue even more, then he may be able to use one as an escape. Just as Klaus was warming up to the idea the pair returned. Sans mask.

Shit.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxx**

Harold could admit he was a little pissed off. He should have known that the junkie artist would be too flighty to actually turn up when they agreed to meet up but he had hoped for an excuse at least. The freak had seemed like the easiest to manipulate so he could get close with the Hargreeves but he couldn’t help but hate the plan at this point. If he’d known that the guy was going to be so unreliable he would have gone for the butch girl, Lord knows that one had enough repressed homosexuality that she’d fall for the first guy who was half way nice to her. But no, she had to be the one to go completely mental and he was left having to charm that fucking fairy. 

He neatened up the lake house, trying to ignore the nerves that he found himself feeling. Harold really needed to see Klaus again and get it through the man’s head that he needed Harold. Afterall a junkie like that was just so hard to love and Harold- well Leonard- was just such a good guy for dealing with the freak’s bullshit.

He knew that for his plan to work he’d have to get close with all the Hargreeves but if he could isolate Klaus enough then it would all be so much easier, the more control he had over him then the smoother the plan would go.

With new resolve Harold settled into a pleasant night of planning.

**xxxxxxxxxxxx**

Pain was a genetic development that came as a response to danger. It warned the body to flinch away from whatever was a threat and the worse this threat was the more pain there was but there is also a point when the pain cuts off. Well, kind of. That point is actually the severing or burning of nerve endings, the ones that are still there will hurt though. 

In films when a character is in pain they will inevitably pass out, the pain is felt long enough to scream and then there is darkness. From there the character is either a grunting mess of getting through it or the camera blinks into blurred wakefulness in a safe place, perhaps a hospital.

As Klaus found out though, this is not true for real life.

The pain was a strangely absent agony, he felt too cold and too warm and his whole body flinched and seized with the pure pain. He wished he could pass out, wished there was some way of escaping this hell he was in. Even the ghosts flinched away from him as he shrieked in pain. His body was sticky with blood and whilst he felt light headed he was coherent enough to feel some disgust at the sight of his pale hand.

That bitch had cut his fucking finger off.

“You sure you don’t know anything?” She grabbed his chin and forced him to meet her eyes. “I have nine more tries till we get to a limb.”

“Fine, fine, I’ll tell you everything I know!”

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

Luther found Five passed out in the city library. It was unnerving to see such a young body so obviously inebriated but luther kind of got it. There had been a few times on the moon when things had felt so hopeless that alcohol was tempting. Luther had never succumbed to the urge though, he knew he was a brutish figure and that he was quick to anger. If he found himself under the influence he knew it could be dangerous.

Five was whining about an eye and a building that had burnt down but Luther couldn’t really figure out what the hell it was his brother was going on about. By the sounds of it the time traveller had given up on preventing the end of times though, which did sound worrying.

It was when they finally got back to the academy that things began to look up though, Luther noticed that Allison’s car was parked out the front and that the door had been left open. The yelling from inside didn’t seem great however.

“You could have gotten yourself killed!” an unfamiliar voice sounded from inside. “Do you realise what could have happened to you?”

“She was going to shoot you in the back!” Diego’s voice screamed back. “I did what needed to be done!”

“But you got hurt, you can’t let that happen Dee.” Luther entered the entrance hall to see a short woman with black hair in a low ponytail standing across from Diego who had a black shirt pressed tight against his arm.

“Um, I found Five.” Luther interrupted awkwardly. “Drunk. At a library.”

The three stared at each other a second before Luther caught Diego’s eye. They all burst into hysterical laughter at the same time.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxx**

It had been Eudora Patch who had found the note from the assassins. She called Diego instantly and had met Allison and Diego a block away. The man at the desk proved useless at first but in this universe Allison was there ready to rumour the answer out of him, she may use her powers rarely but there was little she wouldn’t do for her family. Very quickly they got the room number. 

“So I sneak in, grab Klaus and you keep the car going for a clean escape?” Diego suggested. Patch and Allison exchanged a look before thumping him in unison.

“Or you two go in and I keep look out so one of them doesn’t sneak up on us and you can get out quickly?” Allison suggested and the couple quickly agreed. 

They positioned themselves outside the motel door. All three were determined but terrified to see the state that Klaus would be in. _One, two, three_ Patch and Diego mouthed before bursting into the room.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

Klaus would be the first to admit he was not in the best headspace. He was dizzy from blood loss and the concussion that had landed him in the hotel room and now he was down a finger and locked in a small space having very violent flashbacks to the times he had been locked in with angry ghosts as a kid. To top it off he was still surrounded by ghosts and was too weakened by the head injury to be able to manifest any of them, let alone any that might wish to help. Ben was doing his best to help calm him down but his calming voice was being drowned out by forign tongues trying to tell their stories. Turned out that assassins had a lot of angry ghosts following them, who’d have guessed?

Suddenly he was yanked back out of the closet and into the brighter motel room by the woman. She and her partner were covered in ash and smelled faintly of smoke, Klaus felt his breathing pick up at the idea of them burning down the academy before he remembered he had given up the building Five had taken him to in order to keep his fingers.

“We left a note for your brother.” The woman gloated. “He should be coming for you now.”

And so the beating resumed.

They left again to argue in the bathroom but he could barely hear them over the sounds of the ghosts. Ben sat across from him, bringing some comfort with his presence. 

“They’re her victims,” Ben gestured to the Russian lady who hadn’t shut up. “We can use this. Talk to her.”

“Hi,” Klaus called out nervously, his voice painful now. “What’s your name?”

“Zoya Popova.”

The woman looked over but Klaus tried to push past the burst of fear. Unfortunately all this bought was more threats.

“Zoya Popova.” Klaus replied back and he felt satisfied to see fear in her eyes.

The ghosts were only too ready to tell their stories and the more they spoke the more scared the two assassins got. All their victims clamoured to be heard and to get their revenge and at this point Klaus was happy to oblige. He was scared and frustrated and the more he followed the plan Ben had given him the more hope he felt at leaving alive. It hurt though, letting that many in. He was tired already but they drained him all the more. Till one did the trick.

Hazel’s weakness was revealed with Jan Mueller and the Swiss Alps. Another hour and another bathroom argument. 

Then Patch and Diego bust in.

They untied him and bullets rained down from both sides leaving Klaus ducking out of the way and in front of the vent where a strange briefcase stood. He winked at Ben before undoing the vent and grabbing the case seconds before Diego yelled out and Allison stormed in.

“I heard a rumour you dropped your guns.” Two thuds.

He grabbed the case.

Diego swore loudly.

Patch grabbed his arm.

They got into the car.

And finally Klaus was safe.

**Xxxxxxxx**

The second he arrived at the academy Allison led him off to be treated by Pogo but he could still hear the sounds of Diego and Patch arguing over how risky the other had been. He smiled slightly despite the pain as their arguing and Ben’s constant commentary finally relaxed him enough to feel at home. He smiled woozily up at Allison who clutched his hand tight and with that Klaus slipped off to sleep.

Allison called up her family, grateful to hear the sounds of Patrick and Claire’s voices among the chaos. Her family were away from the drama and Klaus was safe, despite the end of the world she could finally relax.

Diego and Patch sat curled around each other on the sofa, they explained to Luther what had happened between small jokes and ribbing of each other. Luther helped Patch dress the bullet wound on Diego’s arm as he made small talk and tried to get to know her.

Ben sat on the cabinet watching his favourite brother sleep, harrowed by the events of the day he didn’t look away once the whole night. He comforted himself with watching his brother’s chest move up and down.

Five slept off the last of his drink curled around his mannequin lover, he was peaceful. He looked every part the thirteen year old he wasn’t.

Harold and Vanya did not sleep however. They both stayed up, seated. They stared at walls, mirroring each other as both their sanity slipped away just a little further. Revenge on the Hargreeves was the only thing on either mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Um, sorry for the wait. I was on a marvel binge (mostly Daredevil) but the trailer threw me right back into the world of TUA.  
I feel like this fic has so much vanya bashing that I should reconfirm that I do actually like her in canon, this is just an AU where her meds have consequences, it's mostly because usually Luther is the one people don't like but I kinda love him so...  
I was supper determine to get this out tonight so yay me for doing that. I haven’t written anything since like March so....


	5. How I Wrote 'Elastic Man'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Klaus recovers and Vanya snaps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wasn't expecting to post today but i wanted this out before season two. After seeing that opening scene I am so hyped.

I'm** eternally grateful**  
**To my past influences**  
**But they will not free me**  
**I am not diseased**

**\- The Fall, How I wrote Elastic Man**

* * *

Luther could admit he was mad. Five had known they had days left till the end of the world but instead of telling anyone he kept it quiet. Sure a lot had been happening but that didn’t mean he had to wait for his last lead to die out before saying anything. 

“I found all of you, your bodies.” 

And with that admission Luther’s anger left him. He couldn’t imagine the horror Five had gone through. To find any of his siblings dead was Luther’s worst nightmare but to find them all at just thirteen? That was next level trauma, no wonder five was so messed up now. 

“We die?”

“Horribly. You were together, trying to stop whoever it was that ends the world.”

The news that his lead had come up short was hard to take. Luther hated not being able to solve problems and with Klaus still so injured it was getting harder and harder to just sit back and relax but still he listened as Five explained that the eye who belonged to whoever would get them killed was a dead end after the factory was set ablaze the day before. The details of Five’s work made Luther feel ill, especially out of the mouth of a kid but he accepted the information for what it was. 

It was very unusual for Five to reveal this much, he’d spent the entire time since he had gotten back just running around doing secret things/ Luther had missed his brother for years but this new version of five barely felt like having him back. Luther knew he had a complex about being number one and so wanted to know all that was going on but it was more than that. it was hard enough being back on earth but then to have his presumed dead brother back only to have him basically blank everyone? That shit was tough for Luther. he knew that Five thought he was an idiot, all his siblings did but that didn’t mean his brother couldn’t have explained something. It was nice getting the explanations now even if it did sound hopeless.

**xxxxxxxxx**

He knew he was only just recovering, sans a finger because that shit was just gone, but Klaus still found himself meeting up with Leonard for breakfast. The man was horrified when he heard what had happened to Klaus and was all round very accommodating for him blowing the other man off. They found a charming little cafe where they sat and spent the early morning. Klaus could admit he probably shouldn’t have been up and about so soon after being tortured but it felt good to be with Leonard, especially as he was so distanced from it all.

“Have you ever tried to train up your powers?” Leonard asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Your brother and sister never had their powers perfect from the beginning right? So it stands to reason that since you got sober you might be able to like…” He trailed off

“Power-up?”

“Maybe.”

“I don’t know.” Klaus replied, trying to sound less unsure than he was. “I’m better at dismissing them than I used to be and since sobering up I’ve gotten really good at manifesting Ben but Dear Daddy’s version of training involved locking me in a mausoleum till I went nuts.”

“Hmmm, probably best not to try that?”

“Ja.”

“Look, I have this lake house about an hour out of town, we could go down there for a few days and see if we can start to figure these powers of yours out?”

“Oh, a romantic getaway with little old me? Sounds wonderful.”

**xxxxx**

“Hey Van, I bought coffee.” Allison waltzed into Vanya’s apartment coffee and breakfast in hand.

“Allison!” Vanya exclaimed, trying to hide her distaste at her sister’s appearance in her space. “What are you doing here?”

“We found Klaus so I thought I’d let you know.” Vanya nodded in acknowledgment before turning back to searching through her cupboards. She could have sworn she put her spare pills somewhere.

“Damn.” She sighed

“What’s wrong?”   
“I ran out of my meds, I usually keep my refill in my butter container but it’s not there.”

“Oh, do you want me to run to the chemist or-” Vanya cut her off.

“No, it’s fine. I’m sure I just left them at the theatre or something.”

“What do you even take them for?” Allison asked as they sat at Vanya’s small table. Vanya resisted the urge to tell her that it was none of her business, instead explaining her anxiety issues and how she’d always taken them.

“That’s strange, you would have thought if dad had put any of us on anxiety meds it’d have been Ben. God knows he couldn have done with the help.” Allison said, taking a sip of her coffee.

“What do you mean? Ben wasn’t anxious.” Vanya tried to think back but really all she could remember was Ben following Klaus around and clearing up the druggies messes. That didn’t speak of the shyness that Allison implied.

“Sure he was, on missions we basically had to drag him in, I mean he didn’t have a stutter like Diego but it was still obvious.” Allison said, almost flippantly.

“You’re lying.”

“What?”

“You’re a liar, Allison, get out.” Vanya’s face had gone stone cold, her voice icey to match and the ceiling lights flickered in time with Allison’s heartbeat. She gathered her stuff and left. 

As the door slammed shut the tension drained out of Vanya. How dare Allison preach such lies. Ben had been strong, not some scared little boy. She would remember this, she would avenge her brother’s name. Soon they’d see, they’d see what they had done to her and then they’d pay. Fuck the pills.

**xxxxxxxx**

“What happened when they took you?” Five asked, flashing directly into Klaus’s room.

“Hey brother dearest, great to see you too.” Klaus was slumped on his bed with a strange knitted monstrosity on his lap in a wild array of colours. It looked like a unicorn had vomited on a misshapen blanket.

“Yeah, it’s great you're back but I don’t have time for this. The world’s ending in less than a week.” Five seemed more agitated than Klaus had seen him in a while so he decided to show his brother some mercy.

“They were asking me where you were and then they were asking about if you’d said anything.” Klaus replied, trying to block out the mantra of ChaCha’s words that were screaming in his mind. He coughed harshly against the cough that was starting to develop.

“Nothing important?” Five demanded, Klaus held off on laughing but it was hard. This was the exact same tone he used to take if Klaus had taken his book and hidden it when they were still kids.

“No, I mean they didn’t tell me anything. They just argued in the bathroom a lot.”

“They were fighting?”

“Yeah, Hazel’s got a soft spot.” 

And with that Five was gone. Klaus shrugged and continued his knitting.

**xxxxx**

Pogo fixed Grace whilst Diego watched on with hawk-like eyes. Patch had had to get back to work and with that came a shed tone of anxiety for Diego. In the past twenty-four hours his mother had ‘died’, his brother tortured and Patch had come with him to save him. Sue him if he was stressed. Plus he couldn’t help but think something more had happened with his mum. Vanya had been a little bit too ready to disable mum, just like she’d been critical of her in her book and he couldn’t remember seeing mum at all between the conversation they’d had and the psychos breaking in.

“Do you think it was really the masks that did this to mum?” He asked Pogo.

Pogo was silent for a minute but just before Diego would repeat the question he replied. “No, no I don’t. At the time they broke in she would have been charging. As it happens she was in the kitchen instead when she was turned off. I think it’s safe to say one of your siblings took it upon themselves to make a decision.”

**xxxxxxx**

Allison didn’t know why but something about Klaus’s new boyfriend was seriously bugging her. It was totally normal for her brother to jump into things head first but the way that Leonard had responded in kind was odd. The man was too perfect and seemed to be responding to Klaus’s clingyness in kind. This usually wouldn’t be too bad but the way the man acted like a total gentleman removed him a bit too much from Klaus’s usual type to feel comfortable. 

Allison remembered the first of Klaus’s partners she had met. It was a girl named Bee who had had more tattoos on her than anyone else she had ever met. The girl had had a very obvious darkside which was revealed in the flippant way she spoke about fighting in the Ukraine where she was originally from. The second partner of Klaus’s she’d met had been a really sweet kid called Eden who had revealed themself to be Klaus’s type when she’d watched them dip their hot dog in ice cream to see how it’d taste. 

The point was that Leonard was not the usual for Klaus’s taste which seemed to cover people who were very dark or people who were actual dumbasses with stupid chaotic ideas. Leonard was way too straight laced to hold the attention of her brother and so she found herself in the library trying to find anything about him.

It was proving difficult.

She found an address at the same time Five decided Harold Jenkins needed to die. Communication really is a bitch.

The house was in a boring suburban neighbourhood with nothing unusual about it. Allison was becoming more and more sure that going behind her brother’s back was the right move.

xxxxxx

Klaus didn’t want to rush things with Leonard. He knew that that’s what his siblings probably thought he was doing but the offer of getting out of the city was too much to pass up. It didn’t mean they had to be intimate but he also knew no one would believe he hadn’t been except perhaps Diego. He also knew Diego was the one least happy about letting him go.

They arrived in the deep quiet of the woods and Klaus let out a sigh of relief. There were no ghosts around for miles other than Ben. Ben had, of course, always been an exception. Leonard had guided him out to the dock and told him to just clear his mind. Whilst he’d usually find the vagueness of the instruction grating he couldn’t help but feel relaxed in the slight chill of the lake and the calmness of the trees around him. He felt himself melting into his environment steadily, calm taking over completely.

“Now try and reach out until you feel something in your mind.” Leonard instructed.

Klaus kept his eyes closed as he tried to focus his concentration inwards, he reached within until he felt a slight brush within his mind. The lake was totally gone, all his surroundings had disappeared from the smell of pine to the slight rustle of trees, all he could feel was the void and this slight hum. He drew it closer within him until he could finally feel what it was. Hate.

He nearly screamed out in agony from the burn of it, he felt the humidity and could smell the singed sulphuric acidity in the back of his throat. Stumbling from the force, Klaus’s eyes shot open.

“Hey, hey, you’re ok Klaus.” Leonard assured him, helping him down to the floor. “Everything’s okay.”

“What was that?”

“I don’t know, what did it feel like?”

“Hate.” Klaus replied, for a second he could have sworn Leonard’s eyes flashed with fear and something else, something darker before they reverted back to careful worry. 

“Let’s head inside, we can have a cup of hot chocolate and you can calm down.”

Klaus followed him back to the cabin, trying to make sense of all that had happened. He sat on the couch where Leonard tucked a blanket round him and went off to the kitchen.

“Klaus, something isn’t right.” Ben said but Klaus only hummed in acknowledgment. “I could see someone when you did that, I don’t think Leonard could but you definitely started to summon someone. I think you should do it again whilst he’s gone.”

Klaus nodded slightly before settling down to try the focusing thing again. This time it came a lot faster and as he tugged at the hatred, which felt slightly cooler, he opened his eyes. Leonard was in front of him offering a mug. On autopilot Klaus took the mug, still tugging at whatever had reached towards him. He sipped the drink steadily, trying not to flinch as a face popped into view.

The man before him was large and threatening, like the sort of old drunk who’d buy him for a night and then spit on him and call him a queer the next day. He wore clothes for some blue collar job and there was something familiar about his face. Well, some of his face. From the nose up it was a bloody mess as if it had been bashed in. It probably had been.

Klaus ignored the queasiness that had come over him.

“How are you feeling Klaus?” Leonard asked.

“‘m fine L’n’rd.” Klaus slurred out. “Jus’ tire’” 

“He ain’t Leonard, boy.” The ghost growled at him. “That piece of shit’s my son and he had the nerve to fucking kill me. Harry here just put something in your damn cocoa.”

Klaus tried not to react but couldn’t help the jolt of fear that surged through him, what did he mean? Who the fuck was Harry? He stumbled to his feet muttering something about using the bathroom and began to stagger towards the stairs. 

“I know you could see him Klaus, you can’t just leave me like this. Not after what your little club did to me.” Harry - if the ghost was right about the name- called out. Klaus turned to see him at the bottom of the stairs with a knife in his hand. Klaus tried to get up the stairs faster but his limbs weren’t cooperating. 

Leonard grabbed his ankle as Klaus made it to the top, his face whacking against the banister as he tried to get away. Blood exploded out of his nose but he kept kicking out behind him, satisfied when he heard Leonard curse. 

“Klaus, manifest me and you can try to get away!”Ben called out and Klaus did as told.

He managed to solidify Ben long enough for Ben to kick Leonard the rest of the way down the stairs. He sprinted to the bedroom where he’d put his stuff and tried to grab everything so he could run. 

He knocked the suitcase open.

Ben saw a blue light and then his brother was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know i sound like a beg but please comment and leave kudos they make me so happy to see people engaging with this. even if your comment is to yell at me for using bad songs as chapter titles because obviously i should be using the song off of some random devo flexi disc your dad has in his singles collection (too niche? oops). actually, comment song recommendations if you have any. I'm not struggling for ideas but i'd love some new songs to listen to.  
also once again i dont read through my own work till im writing the next chapter so sorry for any inconsistencies but hey thats time travel baby.


	6. Born In the USA

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Klaus goes to war.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow a thematically appropriate song? who is she. it was nearly a bowling for soup song so...
> 
> Also fair warning this is pretty brutal, very anti-war and anti-america so if you agree with the military or think america is the greatest country on earth you might want to leave.

**_Went down to see my V.A. man_ **

** _He said "son, don't you understand"_ **

** _I had a brother at Khe Sanh fighting off the Viet Cong_ **   
** _They're still there, he's all gone_ **   
** _He had a woman he loved in Saigon_ **   
** _I got a picture of him in her arms now_ **

** _ \- Bruce Springsteen, Born in the USA_ **

* * *

Charles ‘Chaz’ Anderson had grown up in a small town in Minnesota, he was the middle child of Patricia and Gordan Anderson who had two other children; Bobbie and Linda. Chaz had grown up in a very normal family with very normal traditions. Church every Sunday and fireworks every fourth of july, Chaz was all american apple pie ready with a fist for anyone who threatened the american way. Then Vietnam happened. Then Bobbie enlisted, went off to war to protect his country and their parents were so proud. They started asking Chaz when he was going to sign up, when he was going to serve his country.

But Bobbie never came home. And Chaz watched as his nieces started to stop asking when daddy was coming home, when the idea of having a dad started to become a far off notion. Daddy became a character in a bedtime story. But Chaz was still expected to enlist. He didn’t want to enlist, he wanted to settle down with Julie and have a couple kids, he wanted to grow old with her and enjoy the good life. Hell, he was a hard worker and the american dream told him all about how he would become a billionaire with the sort of drive he had. Why would he want to fight in a war when he could have all that?

They got the letter the same day Chaz’s birthday was pulled out of the lottery. Robert Gordan had passed away and Chaz was to go off and become more cannon fodder, and for what? To force the american way onto some far off land? To kill men and women and kids he never knew because uncle sam said to?

So Chaz went off to war, and his mum cried when she said goodbye but he’d dad just patted him on the shoulder without a word and he wrote to them for all of the first two months he was there and then he stopped. He wrote to Julie every week and she wrote back at first, she told him about the town and all the things he was missing at home but slowly that trickled off and then Linda wrote to him and told him the news. Julie was engaged. To another man.

And Chaz got used to war.

When the new boys asked if he had anyone waiting where he used to smile and say her name like a prayer he began shaking his head; “Not me, nah. Just a little sister.”. So he looked out for the new guys and he made sure to be nice to everyone and he grew close to them and made brothers out of boys he knew would die here. Would die in a war so far from home, would die and be reduced to a letter sent home to their wives and mothers and sisters but they’d just be memories. There were no gravestones in war.

He fell in with a group of others his own age pretty quickly. Patrick, Dave, Jim and Matt all had his back and he had theirs. It wasn’t home but it sure was family.

  


**xxxxxx**

  


Dave had been in the army for a good few years when Chaz arrived all fresh faced and angry. He saw new guys like that a lot and couldn’t help but come to expect it at this point but there was something a bit different about him. For a start Chaz threw his anger into being productive instead of trying to rage against the system but he also calmed quickly. He wrote a lot at the start but even that stopped quickly but it wasn't till they were friends that Dave asked about it.

“Why’d you stop writing so quickly?” he’d asked one night

“My parents are a bit too happy about me going off here and my girl left me. Far as I’m concerned I’ve only got a sister left.” Chaz had said. He sounded very matter-of-fact but Dave wasn’t surprised. Chaz took no shit.

Besides he was hardly the only one who didn’t write. Dave did fairly regularly but he hadn’t been back to Dallas for years so it was disconnected and irregular, Jim wrote to a girl but no one else, Matt wrote to his mum and Patrick, well Dave wasn’t entirely sure Patrick knew how to write. 

It was Klaus that really changed things though.

He arrived in a blink of blue light that only Dave seemed to notice but he arrived with tear stains down his cheeks looking like he hadn’t slept in weeks. Dave watched on as the tall, thin man looked around desperately before settling his eyes on Dave.

“What year is it?”

“1968, look man whatever you're on you need to come down fast. The Charlies are gonna start up again soon.” Dave replied. The man was confused and out of it.

“Hmm, oh. Yeah.” the man mumbled. “I don’t know what I’m on.”

He promptly passed out.

Apparently Klaus Hargreeves was a pow who had been drugged to the gills then managed to escape and find his way to the camp despite whatever was in his bloodstream. He’d also developed awful shell shock in the process.

Dave wasn’t surprised that Patrick had instantly latched onto the man. Patrick liked it when people were broken, he had a thing about rage that was deadly in a way that freaked Dave out. The rest of their group were completely level headed but had welcomed Patrick because he could play poker like no ones business.

The weird part was that Klaus liked Patrick just as much. Klaus seemed to be scared more by kindness than harsher treatment, as if he couldn’t believe anyone genuinely just wanted to help out and so he was instantly enthralled by Patrick who was anything but nice. They could often be seen around camp telling stories that seemed more and more outlandish to anyone who listened. Klaus was just crazy.

Except Dave couldn’t help to think he wasn’t. Klaus had a way about him where all the crazy seemed halfway normal, he felt like with Klaus anything was possible. Klaus knew things he shouldn’t. He knew where the next land mine was and he knew vietnamese outside of ordering drinks like the others. In fact he seemed fluent in a fair few languages but when anyone asked he’d wave it off as a talent he had developed in childhood. 

“Patrick, so good of you to join us.” Chaz smirked as Patrick joined their little group without Klaus for once. “You had a fight with lover-boy?”

It was common for them to make jokes about Patrick and Klaus around camp but Dave couldn’t help the way he tensed up at each joke. It was okay for them because everyone knew that Klaus was a peaceful hippie type and others were too scared of Patrick to ever truly think he was a queer but Dave knew if anyone ever knew his true feelings he’d be a dead man.

“Who?” Patrick asked, sounding genuinely confused.

“Klaus?” Jim replied. “Tall? Skinny? Total nutcase?”

“Oh, yeah him.” Parkick rolled his eyes. “He was freaking out and it got boring so I left.”

There was an awkward silence.

“You left him?” Jim asked slowly.

“Oh yeah, he was acting completely psycho.”

“What the fuck Patrick?” Dave asked, getting up.

“Well, I wasn’t dealing with that.”

“Whatever, I’m gonna see if he’s alright.” Dave ran off back towards the edges of camp where he knew Patrick and Klaus would smoke together.

He found Klaus curled up on the floor hyperventilating like crazy. Shell shock, okay that Dave could deal with, all the guys got it eventually so the fact that Klaus had been okay for so long was honestly a shock. Still seeing Klaus looking like that made Dave’s chest ache. It didn’t seem right.

Klaus had folded his long limbs into himself as much as he could but he was grasping at his neck like there was something around it. It was the look on his face that broke Dave’s heart. His face was usually quite thin but still open and expressive with his eyes always full of humour but now he just looked ill. Tear tracks showed the dirt on his cheeks whilst his eyes, still large and expressive as ever, just looked haunted.

Unsure of what to do Dave sat next to Klaus and he began to speak.

  


**xxxxxx**

  


The more time Chaz spent with Dave and Klaus since that day the less time he wanted to. He didn’t know what the hell Dave had said to the other man but whatever it was things had shifted. No longer was it Klaus and Patrick going around as a little duo but instead Dave had started following Klaus around like a lost little puppy. If they weren’t being so obvious about it Chaz may have said it was cute. As it was he liked them both and he knew you could get shot for less. Chaz didn’t have an issue with them, it weren't his business but he knew the sergeant didn’t feel the same.

Not that it mattered though, Chaz was pretty sure that they hadn’t actually got together yet, Klaus was still too skittish and freaked by kindness. Sometimes Chaz would see them be mid conversation and Klaus would just shut down completely mid-word. Dave didn’t get mad though, he just moved slightly away and carried on like nothing had happened.

Chaz never had wanted to find out why Klaus was the way he was but it wasn’t hard to start to put things together. It was the off comment here and there, the tendency to avoid talking about his parents or what he did for a living and the aforementioned hatred of kindness. It was the little things till it wasn’t.

“What was your first broken bone?” Matt had asked the group, an innocent question born from boredom.

“I broke my wrist to get out of a school trip in first grade.” Patrick smirked, seemingly happy about the distrurbed looks he was getting. “Wacked the fucking thing with a hammer.”

“Ummmm.” Matt looked about three shades paler and if Chaz hadn’t been feeling the same way he might have laughed. “I tripped as a toddler and broke my leg, my mum loves telling the story.”

“Bobbie convinced me to climb a tree and I fell out and broke a rib.” Chaz smiled at the memory. “My Ma completely freaked.”

“I wore my Mum’s heels when I was twelve,” Klaus laughed in a way that was slightly unhinged. “Daddy-dearest didn’t like that, still not sure if it was his cane or the fall that broke my jaw.”

Patrick let out a laugh but the rest sat in shock. His dad had hit him hard enough to break his jaw? What the hell? They all kind of got that Klaus’ dad was a dick but this was next level.

Of course there were other things.

“Yeah, when Five left Dad put this super creepy portrait up. It wasn’t in memorial though, it was just a warning of what would happen if we disobeyed.” What the fuck Klaus? “It’s fine though cause Five was back in time for Dad’s funeral so it’s hardly like he was right.”

That boy needed help, not a damn war.

It was three nights after Patrick had got blown up that things fell into place for Chaz. He was doing night patrol on his own, not yet having a partner to replace Patrick (and boy was he not sure whether to be upset or relieved about that particular death) when he heard soft voices talking. Chaz cocked his gun and quietly made his way over. Stealth would be his only option if there were Charlies about.

It wasn’t. It was Dave and Klaus talking. They were sat close, closer than what was appropriate and for reasons Chaz would never understand he stayed and listened.

“-didn’t matter, I mean Diego and Patch always believed me and Ben obviously knew everything but the others? They wouldn’t give me the time of day.” Klaus’s voice sounded choked up. “I know I was on stuff since I was like twelve? Thirteen? But still I wouldn’t lie about our brother and couldn’t they take Diego’s word? He was literally there when I got clean!”

“That still doesn’t explain how you got here Klaus.” Dave deadpanned voice replied. Chaz stopped, how he got here? Didn’t that imply it wasn’t the usual enlistment or draft. Now that Dave said it Chaz couldn’t help but think back and realise he had no idea when Klaus got in the country. It was like one day he weren't there and the next he was.

“Oh yeah, I was going out with this guy and he was really nice, like he loved to take care of me and he totally took my side against my siblings but I got kidnapped by these guys who were trying to get to Five.”

“And Five? He’s the time traveller right?” The what?

“Yeah, so Patch and Diego get me out after this bitch cut my finger off and I grab their suitcase as I leave just to be a shit, y’know? And then Leonard is all like ‘We should get out of the city,’ I have this place where you can train your powers.’” Klaus deepened his voice for his impression. “And so we go and it works! Like I actually have some control of the dead other than getting rid of them, so later on I practice it again and he brings me back this drink and it tastes funny-”

“Oh god.” Dave whispers and Chaz can see where this is going.

“Hmm, and I see this guy with his face bashed in and he’s screaming that Harry killed him and then I was being chased and I felt funny and I tripped into the case.”

“Can you go back?”

“I don’t know.”

  


**xxxxx**

  


Time passed and Dave could feel himself falling fast. Every day he and Klaus grew closer and closer and since that night at the bar the tension was high. they were together in some way that Dave didn’t have the words for but if it meant that Klaus would hold his hand he didn’t mind. He’d do anything for Klaus to keep calling him ‘Darling’ with that look in his eye. That look he only ever gave Dave.

War was hard though. He’d been there five years and he couldn’t help but feel like he was living on borrowed time. After Patrick died he couldn’t help but feel it more, his own mortality was slowly creeping up on him. The boys who they were sending in just got younger and younger. Dave felt old. He felt tired. More than anything he was sick of bringing his friends back from the front lines in body bags. Matt went home the month before, he’d been blinded in an explosion. The chances are he’d never see again. He couldn’t read his mother's letters from his hospital bed. Chaz had stopped welcoming the new boys. Chaz had shut down nearly completely and Dave hated it. It felt like his friends were dead long before a bullet had pierced their skin. 

Cleaning Jim’s brain off his uniform was the hardest thing that Dave had ever had to do.

“Hey sunshine.” Klaus sat by his side and handed him a can of food. “You okay?”

“What if we’re next?” Dave mumbled out, leaning into Klaus.

“No, no, hun.” Klaus instantly cut him off, hands moving erratically in the way they did whenever Klaus got anxious over something. “You-you can’t think like that babe, no.”

“Klaus, you can’t just decide it won’t happen.” Dave replied, gently.

“Yeah? Well I just did. You’re not allowed to die.” Klaus said, he stared directly into Dave’s eyes. “Promise me you won’t die.”

“I promise.” Dave whispered.

  


**xxxxx**

  


The last time Chaz Anderson ever saw Klaus and Dave was something he knew would haunt him for the rest of his life.

Klaus was crying out for a medic, his hands covered in red inky blood.

Dave lay motionless next to him.

Chaz went home a week later.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have interesting family stories about Springsteen, Freddie Mercury and Boy George (only one of them isn't a dick) so i can't listen to that song without thinking about them. oops.  
i really didn't want to write this chapter. idk, vietnam just doesn't do it for me.


	7. Mama

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> do you want to lose it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey so i've just started uni and so my updates may pick up or completly fall apart, idk yet. also is it just me or is uni the weirdest thing ever. parties kept getting broken up at freshers coz of covid and there are rumours we'll be forced to stay here for xmas so like, mad shit.

_ **Well mother what the war did to my legs and to my tongue** _  
_ **You should have raised a baby girl** _  
_ **I should've been a better son** _  
_ **If you could coddle the infection** _  
_ **They can amputate at once** _  
_ **\- Mama, My Chemical Romance** _

* * *

It was only four days from the end of the world when Vanya started to hear the voices. If she was completely honest she didn’t know how to feel about them. Some were nice, they told her she was special and that her siblings were wrong, that they needed to pay for what they had done to her. Others weren’t so nice. They told her to do things she didn’t want to do which is how she found herself outside Helen Cho’s apartment that night.

It was a cold night, colder than it should have been and the wind was so very strong but none of this deterred the small woman as she climbed up to the other woman’s apartment. It was a tall building on the nicer side of town, the perfect place for the picture perfect musician that Vanya should have had, luckily Helen lived on the second floor. Vanya knocked on the door.

“Hello, can I help you?” The woman who answered wasn’t Helen. Instead it was a larger woman with long thick dreads and a friendly dimpled smile, she spoke with a heavy southern accent. Oh shit, Vanya thought, I’ve got the wrong address.

“I’m looking for Helen Cho, we’re in the same orchestra?” Vanya asked shyly. She kicked herself for feeling nervous but she didn’t want to mess this up. She knew she’d only have one shot.

“Oh sure honey, come inside,” the woman held the door open. “Helen just ran to the store on the corner but she’ll be back in no time at all. Now what did you want to speak to her about?”

“I wanted to thank her, we had a chat the other day and what she said to me had-“ Vanya paused looking for the right wording. “A deep impact.”

“Ah yes, my Helen has been known to say a thing or two that really gets folks thinkin’. Oh I tell her, I tell her ‘darlin’ just coz I get your tough love don’t mean everyone will’ but that woman is one smart cookie let me tell you.”

“Oh, you're together?” Vanya asked. Her stomach dropped.

“Sure are, got hitched the second they got that law passed.”

Vanya tried to not give any indication that the news had fazed her but this woman didn’t understand, she clenched a fist. Helen was hers, she’d be hers soon enough.

**xxxxxx**

Grace had been the one to find her bumblebee crying over a person, calling out for help half brokenly. Klaus looked rough, tired in a way that he hadn’t been since he was young, and he clung to the man below him with a sort of desperation she couldn’t quite understand. Who was this man and why did he have her son so upset?

Either way it was obvious the only thing to do was help him.

So she whisked them off to the infirmary where she had stitched up Diego’s girlfriend the night before and began to clean the blood off the strange man to try and figure out the wound and how best to heal it. She put him under an anesthetic and sent Klaus out of the room.

It pained Grace to do so. If it hadn’t been for the severity of the man’s injuries she’d be treating Klaus himself. He seemed tired and stressed and seconds away from going into shock. She’d been told he had just been going off with his boyfriend for the night only to return the next day with a different man and what looked like weeks worth of grime. Something had so obviously happened but the metal lodged in the stranger’s shoulder prevented her from trying to help him.

The man wore fatigues from some war and seemed to have come straight off of the battlefield, the layers of dirt Grace washed off only seemed to reveal more dirt. It was his arm that caused her some worry though. The shrapnel seemed to have exploded out, nearly severing the limb completely whilst an infection looked like it was about to set in due to the state he was in. Grace knew she didn’t have a choice, the limb had to go.

She called Pogo.

**xxxxx**

Five hadn’t really given Klaus’s disappearance a second thought, why would he care about his brother going off with some boyfriend when the world was going to end in a matter of days? Klaus’s sudden appearance back changed that somewhat. The trail of blood that led up to the bathroom was the first clue that something had happened without Five’s knowing, the bath seemed particularly covered in grime and so Five decided to investigate.

When he found Klaus it became obvious what had happened. The lack of bandage around the place where his finger had been was an obvious enough give away but the shakes and delicate way that his brother was moving only helped to confirm it.

“You okay?” Five asked, his voice unusually soft.

“Hey!” Klaus smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes “Yeah, I just...long night.”

“More than one by the looks of it.”

“Yeah.”

“The dog tags that boyfriend of yours?” Five asked ironically, Klaus chuckled.

“Something like that.”

“You did it didn’t you?”

“What are you talking about?”

Five breathed in and tried to calm down, his brother had already been through a lot and he probably didn’t need Five to sound too desensitive.

“When did you go?” Five forced his voice to sound softer and not the mania he really felt.

“Viet Kong, 1968.” Five went cold. “Front lines baby.”

“Shit, for how long?”   
“Nearly a year.”

“A year?” He repeated incredulously “Why did you stick around a whole year?”

“I fell in love.” Klaus said, suddenly standing and looking defensive. 

“What happened Klaus?” Five asked, sitting next to his brother on the bed. “We thought you were with Leonard then you turn up here with all your injuries healed?”

Klaus told Five about how his boyfriend wasn’t who he’d said, how he’d tried to drug him but Klaus had over powered him and fallen into the sixties where he had been to scared to use the case incase it took him somewhere worse, how he’d found his very own soldier boy who was bleeding out down the stairs and was being stitched up by Grace, how he didn’t know where the case was because all he’d cared about was keeping Dave alive. By the end of it all Five was livid. How dare Leonard lie to his brother like that and then try to take advantage, how dare life be so cruel to his little brother. He also couldn’t help the slight annoyance at Klaus himself for bringing a soldier into the wrong time like that and for so carelessly losing the case when it could be used as a bargaining chip for the Commission.

“Klaus!” Grace’s voice called out. “You can come see your friend now!”

And with that their conversation ended rather abruptly.

**xxxxx**

Okay, so Dave didn’t love having one less limb. He knew he was a little dumb but he wasn’t completely stupid but that didn’t change the fact that he was grateful to the woman who had cut the thing off. He had grown up in the generation that had been birthed from veterans from world war two and if they could be proud of losing a limb for their country then who was he to be ashamed of it? Yeah, he didn’t even believe that but still he was alive and so was Klaus and that was more than he thought it’d be worth hoping for. He always assumed he’d die out in that war.

But he hadn’t.

He’d woken up with Klaus holding his hand and a strange numb feeling in his other arm right where he knew he’d been shot. The room was white and sterile so obviously some kind of nurses station or something but why had they let Klaus in too?

“Babe, hey babe.” Klaus started cooing and Dave wandered why for a second till he realised he was hyperventilating. “Calm down babe, we’re okay.”

“Where are we sunshine?” Dave mumbled out when his breathing was more stable. 

“The future babe, you got hit and I didn’t know what else to do.” Klaus replied, surprisingly calm.

“Why’re you s’ calm?” Dave slurred through the haze he felt in his head. It felt like someone had replaced his brain with feathers but then hot boxed the room.

“This is the third time we’ve had this conversation Babe, you’re pretty out of it.” Klaus’s voice had a tell tale smile that instantly relaxed Dave. He was out before he could even think to reply.

**xxxx**

In one universe Allison spends her time trying to research her sister’s creepy boyfriend.

In another she goes straight home to her daughter who her ex-husband won’t let her see.

In a third, far stranger, universe Allison ‘asked for’ the Mona Lisa and is living a life of luxury in Monte Carlo, enjoying all of the class that a life of crime has earned her.

This is none of these universes. In this universe just as she left to figure out what was up with Klaus’s new beau Diego dragged her out of the house snarling about revenge. They drove to a motel near the highway after following a man leaving Griddy’s. Allison was getting pretty sick of going on weird road trips with her stabbiest brother.

“So why are we following this guy?”

“He took Klaus,” Diego growled. “And nearly shot Eudora.”

“Oh, revenge. Got it.” How typical of him.

“Um, no? If they’re still running free who’s to say they won’t come after us again? Also Patch said their prints aren’t on the system at all. You saw what Klaus was like in that motel.” Diego ran a hand through his hair. “If something happens to either of them it’s on us for not dealing with it.”

Well how could she argue with that?

They pulled up in front of the motel and went through their usual charade of telling the other to stay in the car even though they knew neither of them ever would before sneaking up the stairs towards the motel room. Just as they kicked the door in they noticed commotion from the parking lot. Allison ran over to the railing only to see the two masks speeding away in a car. Fuck.

Then the bullets rained down on them, she started to tug Diego down the stairs again. If he was serious about following them they’d have to get a move on. Her brother swore every step of the way. She wondered why till she saw the gash across his arm. They’d just shot her brother. 

“They’re getting away!”

“You’re welcome. Not like I just saved your life.”

“Thanks Allison.” Diego gritted out, sounding not grateful in the slightest.

They raced down the stairs only to find the wheels blown. Allison looked around the lot for something else to go after those guys with.

Someone had left the keys in the ice cream van.

**xxxxx**

Vanya couldn’t believe it. 

She’d made first chair. 

She was so proud. 

She couldn’t wait to go home and tell her darling Helen.

**xxxx**

Five could see the sense in bringing Luther with him for their meeting but he couldn’t help but resent it. He knew Luther’s bulk would work for the intimidation but the issue was Luther was too scared. He was young and naive and so, so worried. If it wasn’t so annoying he may even find it endearing. He was like a puppy.

The entire car ride he was asking questions though and the more he asked the more Five wanted to scrap the plan and just welcome the end of the world. Slight exaggeration but it was frustrating nonetheless. The silence in the car when they pulled up was somewhat worse. Five had spent his whole life trying to get back to his siblings but now he was back he didn’t know what was left. How could he talk to these people when his only point of reference for them seemed to be made up more of fiction than fact? When all his memories of them had them fitted onto pedestals or made them charactertures of real people because they were the product of his lonely thirteen year old self who hadn’t had the maturity to truly understand his siblings as contradictory beings that they truly were.

So he told Luther about his work for lack of anything else as they waited for Hazel and ChaCha to show their faces - well masks. The sympathy Luther had expressed was harrowing. He had never wanted any of his siblings to have to experience that sort of solitude but here Luther was. Luther who had spent his whole adulthood alone in that house just to be banished to the moon like an unwanted toy. He had been discarded with his only communication being over sent packages that he never got replies for. It was hard sometimes, to be understood on that level, because whilst you would never wish that pain on anyone it was still a relief that it wasn’t just yours to carry anymore.

Hazel and ChaCha were stupid. They bought it hook line and sinker. Finally things were going his way and Hazel was truly being a great help (for once, a part of his brain whispered).

The ice cream truck was a shock.

He had been settling to wait for the Handler when music sounded from the abandoned road and a van speeded towards them, well as close to speeding as an ice cream van could. He was less surprised to see his dumbass siblings.

Wait- was that...Allison?

Hysteria threatened to overtake Five, had all his siblings lost it completely? That was the sort of thing he expected from Diego and Klaus not Diego and Allison, he’d always thought Klaus was the bad influence in their duo but apparently Diego was equally stupid.

“Neat trick, isn’t it?”

Her voice still made him cold to the core.

“Hello, Five.”

The Handler.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I only kept Dave alive for two reasons: I love amputation fics but want a medically accurate one and ghosts don’t have rights. Like written in my notes I literally have “ghosts don’t have rights- it’s still necrophilia.”


End file.
